The Lightning's season opener went about as sideways as a game can go: a 5-1 loss at Madison Square Garden capped by Igor Shesterkin becoming the first goaltender in Rangers history to score a goal, while Tampa Bay finished 0-for-7 on the power play. Rick and Steve dig into why it wasn't as alarming as it looked — Victor Hedman's comfortably accepted a smaller role (and dropped weight going gluten-free to stay fast at 18 seasons in), John Carlson is still adjusting from running Alex Ovechkin's power play in Washington to feeding Nikita Kucherov in Tampa, and hockey's a "flow sport" that's brutally hard to simulate in the preseason. The Lightning still own the NHL's third-best season-opening winning percentage all time, and they get a schedule edge Saturday against a Capitals team playing the second half of a back-to-back.
From there, it's a deep look at Jalen Daniels' first career start — the first rookie quarterback to play anywhere in the league this season, despite going undrafted. Rick traces how the Bucs got here (Teddy Bridgewater's disastrous relief outing last year, Jake Browning's poor camp this summer) and argues Daniels doesn't need to be great against a genuinely bad Packers team that can't run or stop the run; the defense and Chase McLaughlin's perfect kicking can carry him. A mailbag question floats Daniels as a potential Marty St. Louis-style undrafted success story, and the guys note the historical case for not rushing rookie quarterbacks, with nine of the ten passers drafted this year still holding a clipboard. The back half previews a jam-packed Tampa Bay weekend — Rays-Yankees ALDS Game 1 at the Trop, the Lightning's home opener, USF hosting Temple for a shot at a first-ever conference title, and Florida traveling to Missouri — plus a quick look at Cleveland's Deshaun Watson turnaround under Todd Monken.
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