Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman on Halford and Brough Show on why are the Vancouver Canucks trying to trade J.T. Miller, and why is he okay with it.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Halford: “This is a this a big question. A lot of people have theories. But why is this, why is this happening? Why are the Canucks trying to trade JT Miller, and why does JT Miller seem okay with it?
Friedman: “I mean, it’s one of those things where there’s probably a lot more out there. There’s probably a lot out there that is true, there’s probably a lot out there that is false, and there’s probably a lot out there that is kind of in the middle. And you kind of, you just have to go, you just have to kind of sift through and figure out what you believe is true and what isn’t.
Initially, I thought it was a personality clash. The timeline, as it came this week, seemed to indicate to me that the activated intensity around it on Friday didn’t have anything to do with any teammates, but maybe the organization got to a point where it said, we just have to go.
You know that that game Thursday was rough. The fact how they lost, how they lost. You know, Miller just didn’t seem himself to say the least. He played great on Saturday night. I mean, if you know that, if you if he plays like that, and he was phenomenal, then either one of two things is going to happen. Either Vancouver is going to say, okay, he’s going to stay with us because we need him, or someone else is going to say, look, if Vancouver and Miller feel that they’ve reached the point of no return, then we’ll be happy to take him if he’s going to play like that.
So I just think after I guess, my guess is, and you saw Thursday’s game, everybody was frustrated. I just wonder after that game if it just reached a point where we said, where we said, where the Canucks said we’ve got to do this now.”
Halford: “So there’s a lot of fans that don’t want to see J.T. Miller traded.”
Friedman: “Yep.”
Halford: “Is there, is there any way to put the genie back in the bottle, or is this thing more than likely going to happen?”
Friedman: “I mean, it’s a tough one for me to ask. Like, you know, someone said to me, you know, yesterday, you know, do you ever get tired of talking about all this stuff? And the answer is yes, but if you think I get tired of it, you can only imagine how the people who are directly involved feel about it, right?
Look, I think I thought it was really interesting, you know, a couple of like, last time I did the telethon, sorry, two years ago, did the telethon. You know, we interviewed Natalie Miller as part of the telethon, and, you know, you remember the the Instagram videos last year, like there was a real love affair between Miller and the city. And I saw it like some people were sending me posts on X on Saturday night. I guess when Miller left the game after they beat the Oilers, he rolled down his window and took pictures with some fans who are waiting to see the Canucks leave.
So, I mean, I know, and I’ve seen it. Like that, I know there is, at its height, the relationship between Miller and the Canucks and the fans has been fantastic. And I know somebody who was at the charity event last night who said to me, you never would have been able to tell, I know Miller wasn’t there, but you know, you would never have been able to tell that there was anything bad going on the way that the players treated the fans.
And my point is that, you know, Jason and Mike like these things. They go up and down. There’s there’s phases where what was true today is not true tomorrow. And all I can tell you at this point in time was sometime Friday, Saturday, I think the Canucks and the player thought he was going to the Rangers, and it didn’t happen.
And that is why some people are like, don’t like to tell you anything until it’s done, because things can happen. In this particular case, something happened. I woke up, I checked, everyone was telling me nothing imminent. night, before we recorded the pod, I checked. People were telling me there’s nothing imminent. I haven’t heard anything . But, you know, it’s, this it, this blows hot and cold.”