Promises, Prospects, and Parliamentary Pain: Ottawa Senators (Ep. 7)

Hello, I’m Trevor, your VP of what about next year? And I’m Zack, secretary of sadness. And you’re tuned in to the Misery Sports Company, the official headquarters for fans who’ve seen more collapses than comebacks. If your team has been wandering the playoff wilderness for a decade, then we’ve got a spot for you here at MSC. That’s right here at Misery Sports Co, we continue monitoring. Monitoring the Browns and Titans like a couple of malfunctioning heart monitors, staying calm, cracking jokes and hoping for a pulse just open. Uh, during last week’s deep dive, we audited the Jacksonville Jaguars, a team born in ninety five marked by early playoff flashes, decades of underperformance, and a fan base still clinging to hope like it’s a quarterly bonus. Today we’re going to follow the same winning formula. We’re going to crunch the numbers with the weekly earnings report, throw out some moral victories and sort through the mail room, finishing up with a deep dive and a dose of pep talks. But before we begin the suffering, let’s thank our sponsors for sticking with us longer than most coaches stick with our team. Zach. All right. Our first segment, if you’ll remember, Trevor, is brought to you by Mike Stoops Scapegoat Services when your Kentucky program is stuck at four and eight. Again just blame the brother on staff. We specialize in deflecting accountability. Firing assistants and buying you one more year on that contract. Oh, shoot. That was an all timer. So I figured out who the third guy was because we saw him on the sideline during that game. Who is that man? He looks just like a Stoops. It was. It was me. So it’s Mike, Mark and Bob like some real great creativity there. Stoops family. Yeah, you really could. It was they were talking. We could see Mark. And then the guy turns around and you could just see in his face, my God, that is a stoop. And so that’s Mike Stoops. That’s his brother Mike Stoops, inside linebacker coach. You know inside. You know he couldn’t have he does more. He couldn’t have all linebackers just inside. Just inside. You know that that’s his title. But he does more because he’s his brother. And everybody’s like this guy talks to our inside linebackers coach more than the assistant defensive coordinators. Oh my gosh. Well thank you Mike Stoops and your deflection group for braving every blown play rough season and emotional roller coaster alongside us. Your loyalty really is unmatched. All right. It’s that time for the weekly earnings report tracking the financial and emotional toll inflicted by the Browns and Titans, one soul crushing play at a time. And after reviewing the Titans this week, it’s clear someone’s cooking those books. And probably the playbook, too, If you’ll remember, last week I was not optimistic about our game against the Colts. We were one and six. They were six and one. I was predicting forty one fourteen. If you’ll remember, forty one fourteen is a score that sticks with both of us because that was the Ohio State Florida score. And I I’ve somehow never forgotten that it is too soon. That was eighteen years ago and it’s too soon. And gosh dang it, if I didn’t get pretty close. The final score was the Colts thirty eight and the Titans fourteen. So I was only off by three and all I wanted, uh, was just some semblance of competent football. Uh, all week leading up to it, everybody was talking about this is like a baby versus an atom bomb. And so I just wanted, like, some sort of competent football. And we got a little bit. So I’m, I’m happy we forced four punts, which is pretty good. Okay. Four punts. pints. Uh, that was great when we played them in week three. They hadn’t punted yet, so we did that. Um, that was good. The Colts had never this season had not been sacked on third down. And we got a sack on third down. So that was good. So that’s pieces to build on. Uh, cam Ward looked pretty good. He had no help from his supporting cast yet again, that’s an ongoing pattern that we’re seeing, which is super fun. But he was slinging the ball. He did not have a fumble where his little tiny hands squeezed the ball when he’s trying to just handle it or throw. So that’s good. Uh, he did get sacked four times, but he stood in the pocket, worked his reads, had some really, really good throws. So like, we’re feeling good, especially about the first half. We were down by ten at halftime Joey Slide missed a fifty eight yard field goal. Sorry everybody can’t be Brandon Aubrey. So, like. Fine. It’s a fifty eight. What are you going to do? But, Zach, I am so tired of coming and talking about cowardly coaches every single week on this podcast. Yeah. Let me walk you through this one. Let’s go. Join me in the early third quarter so we get the ball first. We there’s eleven minutes left in the third. We have driven to the Indy forty two yard line and we have a fourth and three after running for no gain on third, fourth and three were down by ten. It’s the forty two yard line of the Colts. Cam immediately looks over and is like, we’re staying out here. Let’s go. What are we doing? And Mike McCoy decides to punt the ball on the forty two yard line. Fourth and three. We’re down ten. It’s a Touchback. So we gained twenty two yards. We gained twenty two yards on that one. And guess what. The very next play Jonathan Taylor rips an eighty yards for a touchdown. And that’s church. That was that was the end. And they absolutely deserved that to happen because they can’t. What what do you have to lose. You are one and six. It is nothing to lose. Literally you have nothing to lose. You could there’s everything to gain. You could gain your players respect. You could gain the fans respect. You could gain the trust of, uh, ownership in the front office by trusting your players and converting it. There is a one of my favorite follows is the surrender index on X, and they rank cowardly punts and cowardly decisions of going forward or not going forward doesn’t have to be punts. So Tennessee punting from there with a surrender index of twenty seven, which I have no context for that punt ranks in the ninety nine point six percentile of cowardly punts this season, and since nineteen ninety nine, it is in the ninety seventh percentile of all punts. What are we doing? Yeah. You’re like you’re basically just best case they’re getting it inside the ten which is thirty yards. Right. Just go for it. Because most of the time your punter is going to kick it out of the end zone. It’s only going to be like a twenty yard punt. They’re going to shank it. Yes. You like you said, you have literally nothing to lose. Just just go for it. I, I don’t get it with an interim coach. Why are you ever punting? What if you were just like, screw it, we’re going for it on every down. Like what? What what are they going to do? Like, you’re not going to get the head coaching job being a coward like this. So you might as well let it rip. Yeah. And I have some, uh, some interesting stats too. I was digging into some of the advanced stats for our teams and I looked at the pressure percentage. Right. So on your passing plays for the Titans, what’s the percentage where cam Ward is pressured? Almost twenty seven percent there. The second highest team in the NFL? Yep. Um, second only to the Chargers of all teams. Oh, random. Uh, yeah. Right. I wouldn’t have expected them at the top, but they are. Tennessee Titans are number one with thirty four sacks given up. So cam Ward is just getting no support right now. Um, I hope he just survives the season. And they get someone competent to help build him up because he’s trying he’s trying to drive the ball down the field. He’s trying. He really is. So yet another soul crushing week for the Titans. Um, but, Zach, how’s your side of the misery ledger shaping up? Uh, just as bad. Trevor. Thank you for asking. Um, so after Mike Vrabel in the New England Patriots exacted their revenge on the Tennessee Titans last week, they hosted my Cleveland Browns. Hey, um. Hey. First half right? Pretty pretty close. Uh, we ended up going down just a few points at halftime. We also missed a field goal. Shocker. I don’t know why that’s so freaking difficult. Um, but we will never win a close game because, uh, we don’t have a kicker, and this wasn’t a close game, so we are going to fast forward, and we got crushed thirty two to thirteen. Um, Dillon Gabriel is hot garbage. He is? Oh, I’m just checking it down way too much. He had I think it was about thirty two throws in the game. He went for like a buck fifty. Um, he’s not driving it like cam Ward is. Is driving it. There’s not a lot of confidence right now. I to me it was a reach in the third round to draft him as a quarterback. Um, he’s going to be a solid backup, I’m sure, but everybody else had him as a six or a seventh round pick. So, um, we are just counting down the seconds to Dr. Sanders in the circus, but that will be, um, but one of the key highlights of this game was actually Dylan Gabriel. He was inside of our own five yard line. It was shotgun. We snapped the ball and Mr. checked down. Checked the ball down to no one. I mean, he had a little bit of pressure and he just whizzed it out of bounds to the sideline. It ended up being an intentional grounding. He was in the end zone. It was a safety. We also ran, uh, two beautiful trick plays. So we actually had a a flea flicker. Right. So for those that don’t know, it’s it’s handing it off to the running back. He, he pitches it back to the quarterback. You would think you’re going to throw deep. You’re trying to trick the defense. No. We actually were setting up for a screen pass, which, if you’ve never heard of that before, it’s because it’s never been done. And it will never be done. No. It was. It went nowhere. Threw the ball onto the ground. Then we ran a backwards pass to our wide receiver who looked, uh, to throw the ball and it went zero yards. He ended up taking off and, uh, I thought it was interesting. After the game, I have an audio clip here. Uh, this is Mike Vrabel, the, uh, the New England Patriots head coach. After the game. We gotta take care of the ball better and continue to find opportunities. They hadn’t turned it over. Uh, and then when their gimmick plays ran out, I thought we played pretty good defense. Okay, so you have you have another head coach, right? Last, last, uh, what was it two weeks ago we had Mike Tomlin talking about the Browns GM. Why would you trade Joe Flacco in division. Now you have a head coach who we actually had on our staff last year. He was a special advisor to Kevin Stefanski. I don’t know why we let him leave. Beating us and then showing up to a press conference and talking about our gimmick plays. It’s just it’s bad. Trevor, I again, I don’t know if Kevin Stefanski will be fired this year, but, um, I will shed no tears if he is. Um, well, as long as he doesn’t come to Tennessee, then we’ll watch him. We’ll watch him leave together. I will say Mike Vrabel loves himself a gimmick play. We we would run several in when he was, uh, with Tennessee. I can think of one specifically where we Marcus was still the coach and we were playing the Patriots. And, uh, they ran a reverse pass to Tom Brady, and he looked like a baby giraffe and like, tripped. And so we ran the exact same play on a third down with Marcus, just as kind of a middle finger effort. So he loves a good gimmick play. But, uh, he’s taking shots there. The, uh, the advanced stats aren’t any better. I mean, the pressure percentage for the Browns is I think we’re like, seventh, um, on that list. We’re, uh, we’re actually toward the bottom. Both the Browns and the Titans are bottom five in terms of pass yards. Um, we’re actually both bottom five in terms of rush yards per game. Uh, I think around eighty. We’re around eighty seven. I mean, we just can’t we can’t generate anything. And I, I go back to you’re you’re paid millions of dollars to play a child’s game. You know, you are grown adults. Just figure out how to move the ball and score some points. The last part that I didn’t even mention, Myles Garrett had five sacks in this game five. He’s being double and triple teamed. He is putting it all out there, very similar to Jeffrey Simmons on the Tennessee Titans. Fantastic players that are just not getting any support. It’s hard. It’s tough to watch. Yeah. So that’s our weekly earnings report. Brutal reminder that heartbreak is part of the job description. And we’re all volunteers. Time for a quick sideline moment a shout out to our sponsor. The real MVP of this operation. Are you trying to get that next job and want to nail the interview by sounding like a local? Well, look no further than Brian Kelly’s accent coach from the Midwest, but need to sound like you were born in the Bronx. No problem. California guy moving to the swamp. We’ll Cajun you right up. Yes, people will notice. Yes, they will laugh at you. Yes, they will bring up the times. And maybe you murdered someone, but at least you’ll be able to pronounce Louisville correctly with Brian Kelly’s accent coach. You know what’s funny about that. And thank you Brian Kelly. We really appreciate your support at Missouri Sports Co. Um, two things that I heard I can’t completely verify, but they were I think they were on ESPN. He, uh, he actually hired a crisis management expert at the end of last season to help him with his public image. That’s how bad. Good gracious. Obviously it didn’t work because everybody hated him in the program. Again, Brian Kelly, head coach of the LSU Tigers. And then somehow they cut his bonus in half for a moral clause that they’re not like, nobody’s giving details. But how did that go? Like, we’ve got you know, we got some dirt on you, bro. Like just take half the money and get out of here. You thought you were getting this pile? Uh. You’re not. And like, it has been universal. The hate from media players. Everybody hates Brian Kelly. like there has not been a single like wish him the best hope he lands on his feet. He’ll be back. Like everybody was waiting for this so they could come out and be like this guy. So, um, seems like a miserable human being, but let him live. He’s going to be laying on a giant stack of cash. Yeah. He will. He’ll be crying into that cash and he sending some our way. So we appreciate him. That’s right. Time to highlight and document the small but significant successes in the Office of Moral Victories. That’s exactly right. At MSC spectacular failure is just part of the plan. But HR insists we still hand out some shiny hardware. So let’s talk about our first employee of the week, my employee of the week. I don’t think I’ve named a Titans player since Morgan Cox in Week one, our long snapper. So, uh, welcome back, our employee of the week. I’m going to go ahead and give it to cam Ward this week. He went twenty two for thirty eight. Two fifty nine with the touchdown. He did have a pick, but it was on. It was on a fourth down. It was fourth and goal and he had to force it to the end zone. Whatever. Like you live with that. It was either a touchdown or nothing, so it’s fine. Uh, he’s looking better. He’s looking more confident in the pocket. And what I really liked from him this week was his fiery leadership. So both the moment that I mentioned earlier with looking at our coach and being like, let’s go for it. Keep the kicking team off the field, what are we doing? And he came over and let Mike McCoy know about it. Like, why aren’t we going for this? Uh, that’s the kind of stuff that players rally around. You want to see your quarterback fighting for, uh, the offense. And then there was, um, kind of a, I don’t know, like a long post route or something. And one of our rookie wide receivers was going to be open, but he stopped running for a second and then missed it and it looked like a bad throw by cam. But on the replay you could see that a receiver stopped and cam let him know about it, both in the moment and then over on the sideline. And that’s I just want to see players who care. You know I, I want to see passion. You’re looking for something to to attach some hope to this uh this season. And I have that with cam Ward as of this past week. So thank you cam I love that he’s he’s driving the ball down the field. And like I always go back to someone like Peyton Manning right. Hall of Fame player. His first season he threw twenty eight interceptions. Just throw the ball cam I don’t care if you throw interceptions. Try to work on it with your receivers. Show some moxie. Just drive the ball down the field. That’s how you threaten NFL defenses. Yep. Just figure it out. Take this year to figure it out. So congrats to cam. Uh, corporate insists that we sprinkle in some cheer, so one more trophy has to be handed out. Zach, who else made the cut this week? Our second employee of the week goes to Myles Garrett. Uh, typically I would not hand out one of these. When the Browns get crushed, I would go find someone else and celebrate with them. But Myles Garrett was just phenomenal. Um, he never gets a one on one, uh, block. He is, you know, the Cleveland Browns star defensive end. And he is a future Hall of Fame player. So he signed a big contract extension. He’s unfortunately here for the you know foreseeable future for him for us it’s great right. He’s phenomenal. He’s one of the probably the best defensive player in the NFL. But um thank you Myles for putting in the work. Uh hopefully Kevin Stefanski can figure out the offense. I know and I loved seeing this week a vehement shutdown of any trade talks around Myles Garrett that I feel like is at least one good move that we can say that the front office is doing is not trading. Uh, Myles Garrett. And on the Titans side, they had to come out this week and say anybody uh, whose name is not Jeffrey Simmons or Cam Ward, you can inquire about, but those two are staying. Yeah. Everyone else, uh, give me a ring. Yeah. I’m looking for draft picks. Yep. Oh, man. Well, plaques can wait. The mail room’s calling. Trevor, what’s in your inbox? Straight out of the mail room. We’ve got three submissions that I wanted to share. So the first one is from Snack Protein. Uh, as you’ll remember, I am our resident Mavericks fan. Along with Zach’s Cavaliers representation, we often cheer for the Cavaliers in joint. That’s right. It’s been a start to the season so far for the Mavericks. It’s been an experience. All we heard all summer was that this team is going to be Incredible defensively and we’ll see. Maybe we can score when Kyrie gets back. But defense defense defense defense wins championships. That’s why we traded Luka. It’s all I’ve heard about. And we’ve surrendered like one twenty something to the Wizards. Uh we got dominated by Wemby who’s a freaking alien. But anyways snack protein on X says Anthony Davis is so maddening because if he would just stop doing all the things he sucks at, he would be awesome. And he is incapable of that. And that sums it up because he is really good at a lot of things. And yet I had to sit through a full game of Anthony Davis like fadeaway jumpers from just inside the three point line. Like who? What? Why, why is that the offense I don’t get it. I don’t get it time after time. It’s driving me crazy. I did want to also give a shout out to Boston Connor on X. He had a clip from the Fox pregame show, and I will say that I am firmly in the camp of. I am way more Fox NFL pregame than CBS. I think Fox is hilarious. I think they have good rapport. I love those guys. But this was from this was from the last week. This is and I’ll crank the sound. It may be hard to hear, but this is Terry Bradshaw who’s always a wheels off ride, giving a recap real quick. But the thing that I would worry about more so in Washington is the other day, I text Andy Reid and I got a text back and I thought it was Andy Reid, but it’s some guy selling pigs. But I sounded good. I should have told you all that. So y’all would have thought I actually talked to Andy Reid, but I didn’t really know what. It was live on the air. It goes to History and who’s looking like, what are you talking about? Terry Bradshaw so insane. Anyways, but my post of the week comes from Trevor Bird zero zero a Titans fan on X who says, all I’m going to say is if Mike McCarthy, you know, Super Bowl winning head coach that was fired by the Cowboys last year. All I’m going to say is if Mike McCarthy legitimately has any interest at all in this job, then you fly him out tomorrow. People might say it’s a boring hire. If having a good offense and developing the QB is boring, I am on my knees begging to be boring. I am doing that thing that hoes do where they do a handstand against the wall and make it clap upside down to be boring. And I think that captures what we’re all feeling. I don’t care if it’s boring, you know, uh, a retread. If somebody can just give us a competent offense, we will do whatever it takes to get that back. So Sark’s coming. He’s coming. He said Texas is is boring. Trevor. Oh. Oh, I got you. Gosh. Not Sark. Uh, he’s probably drooling at cam Ward, though. Having to call plays for Manning. All uh, which which Manning is that arch Manning. It’s been rough. That has been rough. Oh, shoot. Well, there’s a masterpiece in the fine arts of misery. Zach, what do you got? All right, so I have one submission. This actually comes from one of Lane Kiffin’s press conferences. So Lane Kiffin is the head coach of Ole Miss in college football. Uh, Ole Miss actually just had a huge win against Oklahoma. And so Oklahoma’s head coach is Brent Venables. Used to be with Clemson. Um both good coaches. But When Lane starts winning, the troll comes out in him, and so it’s a little bit of a longer clip. It’s about 90s. The first part of the clip, you know, is fine, and then all of a sudden Lane’s brain starts firing. So I will, uh, I’ll kick it off from there. Is your thoughts? Following the game, coach Brent Venables said he felt like he he had the better team. Just your overall thoughts on that. Mm. That’s a interesting take. Um that’s a, that’s a hot take and better team. I wouldn’t have thought that people watching um would say that you know, I felt that one we won at their place in whether that as a defensive head coach you would normally, um, you know, wish for and won by eight points. And I think we left a lot out there. I think we should have won by a couple scores. So I don’t know know how he evaluated that game, that they were the better team. I mean, we had way more yards, twenty one first downs to fourteen, and we played what, eighty seven plays of offense. And they had one sack and didn’t force any turnovers. That’s a that’s a interesting take. But what whatever he needs to say um it also following up to road trips maybe maybe they had the better team last year too when we beat them. Sorry. Yes, sir. Um, following up, um, on the road against Georgia, you had the better team in Oklahoma when we beat them fifty five nineteen, in the national championship. And you had the better team at Clemson when we beat him forty five forty. Um, in the national championship at Alabama. Whew. Next question. My bad. Joey Freshwater from the top rope. You could start to see his brain start firing. Like, you know what, I, I can’t I can’t let this slide. Can’t. The troll is coming out. You know, Ole Miss is a great team. They look like they’re headed to the playoff. I’m here for it. As long as it’s not against our Buckeyes. Um, he will be insufferable if he beats if he beats a top team like Ohio State. But yes, God bless you. Lane Kiffin. Yeah, yeah. M.Sc. Thrives on despair. And this week delivered in spades. Congrats to the mailroom honorees. Your awards are on the way. Ready to join the Hall of Digital Heartbreak? And thanks to our sponsor, who somehow finds joy in our weekly descent into chaos. This next sponsor is the Browns trick play timeout services. When you call the gadget, confuse everyone and end up taking a second and eighteen anyways. We provide the clipboard confusion and extended third downs. Thank you to Kevin Stefanski and the Browns. Trick play timeout services. Since I’m sick and tired of it. Trevor. I’m just I’m over it at this point, but they’ll never see the next one coming. That has to be the thought. Like every time. Like, sure, we’ve tried this, but they’re not gonna see this next one coming. Yep. They’re sitting on all the short routes. Dillon Gabriel can’t throw the ball farther than five yards. Dillon. Poor Dillon Gabriel. Well, we’re entering into the deep dive. Our weekly business review of tears, triumphs and everything in between. So, Zach, what’s your executive summary for us this week? Thank you. Trevor. Uh, so if this is your first time listening to Misery Sports Co, every week we choose a team. It could be professional. It could be from the college ranks. We have been in the professional realm recently. Um, that’s where we’ll stay this week. But, you know, we will be dipping our toes into college football, college basketball and all the other sports in between. We may even go fully global, but we’re going to stay international here. So this team is from the NHL. They are in Canada and we are going to talk about the Ottawa Senators. Oh, okay. So a quick question for you, Trevor, because truthfully I had absolutely no idea. Do you know, geographically speaking where Ottawa is. So I think of the three main cities Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, where do you think or maybe you know where Ottawa is located? Okay, so my brain says starting from the western side, like above Washington, there’s Vancouver over there. And then you go a little further east and you have Calgary and like Alberta middle of nowhere. And then as you go further east, oh, man, I’m gonna say it’s in that clump of like maybe a little east of Toronto. You got. You got it. Is that right? It is. Yeah. So it’s east of Toronto. It’s it’s the closest it’s two is is Montreal. But, um. Okay. Yeah. It’s well done. I had no idea. I also had no idea that Ottawa is the capital city of Canada. Turns out should probably be Toronto. But it is, right? Yeah. So let’s dive into the Ottawa Senators. So the Ottawa Senators were actually founded in eighteen eighty three. So they are one of the OG hockey teams. They didn’t have a lot of gadgets back in the day. It was cold. You just figured out how to make some ice and you skated on it. They would go to like fairs, um, and and compete against teams. Uh, so what’s interesting with Ottawa from eighteen eighty three to about call it the nineteen thirties. Right. Nineteen thirties they have some financial issues. Um, during that time period, they actually end up winning eleven championships. So pretty solid. Yeah, pretty solid era. I’m going to say there were not that many teams back then, but sure, nonetheless we’re going to give them credit. So they moved the franchise to Saint Louis in nineteen thirty four because of all the financial issues, and they become the Saint Louis Eagles in nineteen thirty four. It was such a bad transition. They actually disband the team after that year. All of the players scatter to other teams, and for the next sixty years there is no team in Ottawa. Holy to the cow! I didn’t know this, but to the point where, you know, sixty years later in the nineties, they they restart the team. They don’t claim any of that history from eighteen eighty, whatever it was, eighteen eighty three to nineteen thirty four, Thirty four. All those championships, the NHL just. They completely disconnected. Well, that’s so crazy because it didn’t go anywhere. Then that history just died, right? Right, exactly. It has to go somewhere that you would think you would fight for, you know, the records and everything. But I guess because it was such a long time, someone reasoned that they couldn’t have the history, which I think is crazy. Okay, okay, that timeline makes sense in my head though, because I in my head I had them as like a later expansion team. So when you said eighteen hundreds, I was like, I am so far off, but there was this dark gap. So they were they were ready for hockey to come back. They were probably starving for it. Yes. So they were campaigning for it. And you’re right, they treated it as an expansion team. So in nineteen ninety two, Bruce Firestone, the real estate developer in Ottawa, good old Bruce Bruce, he, uh, he campaigns the NHL with his group. They are successful, and in nineteen ninety two they start as the Ottawa Senators. Everybody’s excited. First game of the season, they end up winning. Uh, they would go on to win ten games that whole season. Oh no. And adopted the fail, uh, strategy. Right. So you’re just going to tank for the next three to four years? Yeah, we’re going to tell nobody, but we’re terrible. We’re going to try to get as many draft picks as we can those first four seasons. Trevor, think about this. You’re you’re an Ottawa Senators fan. Those first four seasons, they win seventeen percent of the time, which is fifty percent less than the Browns right now. So oh rough rough. Oh that’s bad. However from nineteen ninety six to twenty sixteen they actually end up going to the playoffs sixteen times. Okay. So they had Dominik Hasek, uh, Marian Hossa. Alexei Yashin. Jason Spezza. I don’t remember, I think they might have. They had Zdeno Chara. Oh, wow. Okay, so they ended up trading for him. Um, Daniel Alfredsson. So several Hall of Fame players. The issue with the Ottawa Senators is they could never get over the hump. So throughout this time period, right from the nineties on down, they lost in the first round of the playoffs. Ten seasons. Oh, so you mean getting to the playoffs? You keep building, building, building and you’re done very quickly. Um, early two thousand. They actually they actually end up bankrupt again. Minor detail. Hey, uh, NHL, something’s wrong in Ottawa. Can we get a handout here? They actually get some emergency funding, and that forces the sale eventually. so they actually had to go into bankruptcy protection. Um, and Eugene made manic buys them in August of two thousand and three. Okay. So in two thousand and six, they made it to the Stanley Cup. Hey. Great job. Um, end up losing to the Anaheim Ducks for one. So that’s about as close as they’re going to get to a quote unquote championship. So if you think about, you know, their expansion history, they have never won a championship. Um, and the last eight seasons. So after having some pretty decent success the last eight seasons, um, they’ve only made it to the playoffs one time, and they ended up losing in the first round. Shocker to the Toronto Maple Leaf Maple Leafs. Ooh that hurts worse losing to them. Oh yeah. So I think this like it’s it kind of touches on Misery Sports Co. And you know what we’re all about right. Because there’s different situations different scenarios. Like we can point to the Titans and the Browns and say like, yeah, they’re hot garbage. But someone like the Ottawa Senators, they’ve had some success. They’ve gone to the playoffs. They’re trying to build, but they never can get over that hump. Yeah. And I think that’s another maybe facet of Misery Sports Co that we can touch on is just the teams that can’t get it done. They’re kind of in the middle. Yeah. And they never get that playoff success. Yeah. And it’s it’s that regular season hope. And it becomes so repeated like the pattern repeats itself so many times. And recently, uh, the Cowboys have gone through this where you’re going to have a lot of success in the regular season. You know, you’re going to make the playoffs. But you know what’s going to happen in the playoffs either it’s going to be that first round. If you’re lucky enough to get past the first round, you’re going to get bounced the next one. And so it’s like this defeatist attitude you you try and fight it off. But you know, I’ve been through this so many times and it just hurts. And you keep thinking maybe this year it’ll be different and then you get bounced again. And that’s a special kind of misery, a special kind of pain to have that hope for eighty two games of a season and then not be able to taste the the second round, it just hurts. Yeah. And it, uh, you know, I feel for a team that has financial issues too, like, thank goodness our teams haven’t dealt with that. Like, I couldn’t imagine not being able to spend money on like draft picks or acquiring talent just because we are broke, right? I ain’t got no money. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. Crazy. Mm. Man, I Ottawa Senators seem like. Uh. I don’t know, one of those middling franchises. When I think about the NHL, like you have the original teams. Clearly Ottawa went back to there. It’s unfortunate that they don’t get to claim that history, but it’s just kind of one of those forgettable teams. And I love those teams because the Titans are such a forgettable NFL team. Like, I don’t think I’ve ever met somebody who was like, I’m a Senators fan. And like, maybe if I lived in Canada, like that would probably be more possible. But I’ve never met anybody who’s like, I love the senators. And similarly, I think I’ve met two Titans fans in real life ever. Like if I didn’t see him on TV, I wouldn’t know that they existed. And so you think they would have a bigger following being the capital city of Canada. But like Toronto, even Calgary, I mean, they all have far larger followings from what I see, you know, in the league. Yeah, but they do have a great mascot. Spartacus is great. Yeah. And I would encourage our listeners to go check out a video. This was probably I’m going to guess six or seven years ago it seemed like it was pre-pandemic, where for like the first home game of the season, they had their. So they have Spartacus, who’s like a big furry, like a good mascot. And then they also have like a person dressed up as like a Roman soldier or whatever. And this person came out with like a shield and decked out and stuff and tried to pump up the crowd. And he had a really long speech, and it just devolved like it was way too long. People were over it. But he had he had the speech taped to the inside of the shield. And so every now and then he would just look at the shield and like, ah, read a line and then go, oh! And the crowd would go crazy. And after the fifth time, people started to turn on this dude. So by the end of it, the entire stadium’s booing this man at home when he’s trying to pump everybody up. And that’s always what I think of. The first thing I think of. At Ottawa Senators is just this poor guy out there who couldn’t memorize his lines, and everybody’s booing him as he’s trying to pump up the crowd. It’s it’s really something to behold. My only other, uh, memory of Ottawa is when we would play when Wayne Gretzky’s 3D hockey. Oh, yeah. On N64. Like, what, nineteen ninety nine? As kids. And we would just crush them with the Dallas Stars? Yeah, yeah, they were. They were pretty, uh, pretty easy at that point. But man, we used to play that in college all the time. We played a bunch of Wayne Gretzky. We would play is. This is weird? I don’t know how it happened, but we would play as the Washington Capitals. And you were Sergei Bondra, and I was Joe Juneau. And we would run through teams. We would have bets with nobody, just ourselves on if we could beat these teams. At one point, we were tracking our wins and losses against our rivals on the whiteboard in our room. For. No. There were no steaks. Yeah. Oh, Hextall stopped everything. Oh my gosh. Yeah. It was it was such a great game. Gosh, that game is so good. Well, before we plunge into more chaos, a quick shout out to the folks keeping this train wreck on the rails. Our next sponsor, Missouri sports coach. Speaking of Missouri, sports coach is brought to you by Mascot pregame. Let’s kick it up a notch, you big furry knucklehead. I know you’re excited to watch your team win, but you know what would be pretty kick ass if you raw dogged this Cup pregame and then got in a fistfight with the former Heisman winner. Why is he so mad? Who cares? Eat this powder and go touch his hat. What’s the worst that could happen with mascot? Pregame. Hold on. Pause. What? What? What? Heisman winner was this? You need contact. You didn’t see this? Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Well I can’t it would be worthless to play here because it’s entirely visual. But there was a an ESPN spot where for some reason one of their traveling NFL or college road shows was like it, Alabama A&M or somewhere in Cam Newton was there and they had a mascot race. So then one of the mascots after the race goes over and gives a little like playful, like, oh, I lost. Goes over to Cam Newton and I think touches his hat. Cam Newton winds up and smacks the crap out of this mascot like full on just whap. And then like, steps to him. Like what? And it turned from like, oh, this is cute and funny to like, that guy needs to get out of there. And no, no context given for like, they didn’t address it on air. Nobody knows what happened, but Cam Newton smacked a mascot. Why the disrespect? The disrespect, disrespect. But we would like to thank the pregame that that great sponsor. Yeah. They’re keeping our dream alive. Whatever that means for us. Well, it’s time to end on a high note. Yes, that’s right, it’s pep talk season where we force a little sunshine into an otherwise cloudy week. At MSK. We try to end every meeting on a bright note. And my pep talk this week Trevor goes to Cooper flag in the Dallas Mavericks fans. Oh buddy Mavs fans I am I am one of you. I you know I follow that team just as much as I do the Cavaliers I celebrate their playoff success. Love the run with Luka to the finals. It was magical. Um, you know, just have a little patience with Cooper Flagg. He is in such a difficult position. Cooper Flagg, for those that don’t know, was the number one pick in the NBA draft last year. Uh, he is. Correct me if I’m wrong. Trevor, eighteen years old. He is eighteen years old. That’s right. He is going to be giving his all. He’s still trying to figure it out. Playing against grown men. He is a great talent. But there’s going to be some bumps in the road. Right? So the second that you start comparing him to Luka is the second you are going to get even more angry than you are currently with Nico. Who is your GM? Who it’s hard to imagine. It’s hard to imagine getting angrier. But you’re right. Yes. And you are allowed to be angry with Nico. You can boo him anytime you see him every time. I fully support that. But Cooper, another pep talk to you as well. Just hang in there, go through the process, figure out you know what your strengths are. Build on them. I know J-kidd is putting you at point guard right now. I have no idea why. Um, just just go with the flow. Hopefully Kyrie comes back sooner than later. What? Trevor what is Kyrie’s timeline at this point to come back. They’ve been really weird with it and won’t give a timeline. And I think their thought was like oh that’ll help us not put pressure on anything. But it’s caused chaos because we just we have we have no clue. But like February maybe I don’t know. Oh, boy. All right, Cooper, we’re gonna have to batten that. We’re gonna have to batten the hatches. I you know, they can still they can still have a good season. I think the Cooper flag is a good player. I just feel like it’s so unfair to him to walk into this situation and be like, oh, Luka’s averaging forty point triple double right now. Like, what are you doing? Hang in there Mavs fans. You got to get behind the team. You’ve got pieces. I hate Niko I can’t even go into that right now. No, Nico, I. I don’t have time tonight to edit all the beeps for how I feel about Nico. So I’m with you. I’m not going to get into that. But thank you for giving a pep talk to Cooper. I love that he needs that. Um, you got it. Trevor, what have you got for us? Funny you bring up Cooper, because my pep talk tonight is for his teammate Kyrie Irving. Uh, we just talked about him, so how about that? Um. Um. Kyrie. Dear God, please heal up. Do whatever you need to do to your body. Take your time. It’s not going to be good this season. Take your time. But I know you watch that offense. Like I have to watch that offense. And I know it crushes your soul inside because it’s some of the ugliest basketball I’ve ever seen. It is. It used to be painful at times to watch in the early Luca years, where we would have Luca and four scrubs who just looked for Luca and didn’t know what to do. Well, now we have five lost people because one of them is an eighteen year old getting adjusted to the NBA, and we’re asking him to be point guard, and the rest of them are either really tall or waiting for an open shot and can’t create on their own. So it’s been tough. It’s been tough. But Kyrie hang in there. Get better. I am somehow super a super fan of yours. And it’s been a journey going from the Cavaliers. Thank you for that championship I also love the Cavaliers just as much as I love the Mavericks. And and followed that and through a weird sequence of events. I am just one of your biggest fans now and I don’t need you to save this team. But in a different, similar sense. I need you to save this team because it’s really bad. So rest up. Get better. We love you, and we’ll see you when things heal. Don’t rush back, because I think we all saw what happens in game seven last year of the finals. When you rush something and it’s it is heartbreaking. It’s absolutely heartbreaking. And I give credit to Kyrie and the Mavs because when he first joined the Mavs he was like hot off of flat earth. And like these crazy Covid takes. And he has been nothing but all about basketball. Yep. My concern Trevor, is that I think that Luka was bringing that out of him and that they were like kind of vibing with each other. Yep. I hope Kyrie stays tethered to the literal earth, the literal round earth. And I hope that the challenge of. mentoring somebody with as much talent as Cooper Flagg also brings that out. But I totally agree. And for some reason, he and Jason Kidd vibe. And so that was a big reason why we extended Jason Kidd recently. But not everybody vibes with Kidd C D’Angelo Russell, who is a serviceable point guard and is a bit of a roller coaster, I get it. But he’s a point guard. Why can’t he start? I don’t understand. Let him start. I don’t get it. But anyways Kyrie take care. We’ll see you soon buddy I love you. Love you Kyrie. Alright that is another week in the books at Misery Sports Company, home of Shattered Dreams and surprisingly resilient fans. We hope you’ll become employees here by subscribing to the podcast wherever you listen. Spotify, Apple, Amazon, wherever else. Follow us on X. formerly Twitter. It’s really Twitter. I don’t really call it X and checking out our new website miserysportsco.com. There you can find our mail room where we put all of our tweets of the week. We put a quick breakdown of our team that we covered in our deep dive. We also include the podcast itself so you can listen right on the website. Until next week I’m Zach and I’m Trevor. See you next time.