The Return of Cliffy Hockey in Boston | Ep. 153

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0:51 Speaker 1: Welcome in everyone to another episode of Bruin's Tape to Tape. I will be your host today. I am Maria from Watertown. I am joy as always by my steadfast and reliable co host Caroline with a kay, how are you today, my friend?

1:08 Speaker 2: I'm good, I'm good. Happy recording Monday.

1:12 Speaker 1: Yeah, we've been able to enjoy some downtime ourselves while the hockey world is on a little bit of a hiatus as well. But today we're going to continue with what we have somewhat become a little bit of a tradition for us and doing some player profiles, and today we're going to focus on Honor Clifton who returns to Boston. Cliffy Hockey is back. In what way, shape or form that translates, we'll find out soon, but he comes back on a relatively friendly deal familiarity with the organization just by way of a refresher.

1:50 Speaker 1: Honor is thirty one years old and he signed a two year, four point five million dollar contract with the Bruins with a a two point two million dollar annual cap hit. We all know that from his prior experience here in Boston that he does play with a high degree of energy, sometimes a little frenetic, but probably had his best year with the Bruins in twenty twenty two twenty twenty three, which ultimately led to Connor basically pricing himself out of Boston as a free agent, and was one of those things everybody knew it was coming and everyone was like, hey, go out and get your bag of cash.

2:32 Speaker 1: And he did with the Buffalo Sabers, but the results never really translated with the Sabers, and I think a lot of that is due to the fact that that was a pretty bad Buffalo Sabers team at that time, both offensively, defensively, all the way around. I don't think you can say too much a Levy too much criticism at any players on that Buffalo Sabers team at the time. But he does come back to Boston. He is a right hand shot defenceman. Then much has been made about the fact that the Ruins don't have enough depth with right handed shot defenseman.

3:11 Speaker 1: I'm not sure this is the upgrade, honestly, that one was looking for. I think part of this signing is a little bit of a stop gap because Ruins are going to start the season the first seven games without Charlie Matcvoy. Not that I'm saying I'm not comparing the two, no, but.

3:31 Speaker 2: That's a big gap regardless of the type of defenseman any of them, like all of the defencemen on the roster, are going to be picking up extra slack and you need to have or don't have enough right handed defenseman period. And then you've got to bring in somebody who is a little bit more experienced, who played with some of the guys currently on the roster.

3:52 Speaker 1: And just as a reminder, Karna Clifton was part of that twenty nineteen year and making it to the stand only Cup finals. In the Cup run, he did get a decent amount of ice time.

4:05 Speaker 2: Yeah year, Yeah, He's played with Sean Corally in Boston, he played with Pasta, he played with Chucky. I think that's everybody that he played with.

4:18 Speaker 1: On that roster that far back.

4:21 Speaker 2: Crach was that, no, Yeah, I'm I think that he is probably a little bit of a stop gap at least in that regard some insurance in the in at the start of the season, especially because of Chucky being also the right handed d and they're being a lack of them to begin with. For folks who maybe aren't familiar, who don't necessarily remember, there's the concept of Cliffy hockey that initially was a joking term meaning, oh, it's chaotic and he's a little out of control and he's just out there being crazy, And that sort of changed for him as a defense as a player under Jim Montgomery.

5:02 Speaker 2: And if I'm recalling correctly, at one point Jim Montgomery had said, yeah, we don't use that phrase anymore. But when he's at his best, being very physical and dominant out on the ice, I think you can still affectionately call that Cliffy hockey because I think he has a very distinct playing style. When he has a very specific role, he does incredibly well. My impression, and I don't know if you had also kind of had this impression when he left Boston, he seemingly fell a little bit by the wayside, maybe was underperforming or I'm going to use this phrase very loosely, quote unquote getting worse as a player, And I certainly went into my research on this episode with that mindset.

5:52 Speaker 2: But I have to say, and hopefully this is going to be a little bit reassuring for you, Maria especially, he actually is in great shape. He left Boston to go to a Buffalo team that at the time was still very much so actively dying under the leadership of Kevin Adams. Remember their Cinderella transformation literally only happened about what a quarter of the way into last season, So keep that in mind. And so going out there and knowing the type of defenceman that he is, he didn't really receive a ton of guidance.

6:36 Speaker 2: And when you're that type of defenceman and you're not really being given a good structured role and you're in an organization that is constantly losing. Buffalo is a massive hockey town. They love the Sabers through the good times and the bad, and so there is a lot of pressure to perform well for fans that truly love the franchise and Buffalo was also and still is in arguably the most competitive division in the entire league. It can be easy to look at him, look at his situation, and interpret a decline, but in reality, he's remained remarkably stable over the last couple of seasons.

7:24 Speaker 2: First of all, you cannot deny the positive impact of a player coming quote unquote home. Right, He's still to maintain an apartment in Boston all these years, So who is renting his apartment with Fraser Minton renting Cliffy's apartment. One of the young guys is actually living in his house, right, So he has no place to live right now. Sure he's found something, but yeah, having a player come home is going to bring that positive mental attitude an approach to his game right off the bat, which is going to be great.

7:57 Speaker 2: I think we saw that to some degree with Sean Corally. The other thing that I think is going to go in Cliffy's favor is his style of play is probably a better fit with the coaching style of Marco Sturham, even more so than when he was in Buffalo when he first started out there. And again, it has less to do with overall talent and more about that role clarity. We've talked about that hundreds of times on this podcast, where if a player doesn't have a specific role or a job, then he becomes a jag. And for a team to be successful, you look at every team that goes on a deep Cup run, those teams that actually win the Stanley Cup, every single player has a clear role in responsibility and somebody else who can easily transition to fill some of those responsibilities when necessary.

8:55 Speaker 2: Connor Clifton, he's the type of player who has to exist for a reason. You have to ask what is the hockey problem that he is solving. He is an incredibly physical right shot defenseman. He closes gaps very quickly, he wins battles, and he ends these own possessions. So imagine him with someone like Jonathan Asparo like we talked about in last week, where Asparo is very effective at ending defensive zone time, and partner him with somebody like Connor Clifton, and Cliffy is gonna then lay out some pretty massive hits at the same time.

9:33 Speaker 3: So I find that very exciting. I'm looking forward to the depth that he brings. Yes, it's still a little to me. The signing itself is a little okay?

9:44 Speaker 1: Does that speak to what was available in the market and the fact that you needed something to potentially bridge the gap of not having Charlie McAvoy in your lineup for the first seven games of the season. Ye. I do recall saying to myself those of us who are fans of the Bruins, knowing that his final season in Boston was likely his best career year. So that was the twenty twenty two to twenty three season where he's played seventy eight games, five goals, eighteen assists, twenty three points, and he was a plus twenty yeah, sixteen minutes and penalties, which honestly not too shabby given the physical level of fight, which means to me he knows how to deliver a hint and do it within the parameters of what's allowed.

10:36 Speaker 2: Yeah.

10:36 Speaker 1: Right, A little bit older now that those statistics haven't continued to translate throughout his career or his time with Buffalo and then a very short period of time with the Pittsburgh Penguins last season.

10:50 Speaker 2: True, I did also take a look at some more defensive significant stats, and yes, he played a lot less in Pittsburgh. One of the better ways that you can really evaluate his performance over the last three years away from Boston is looking at the per sixty rate of everything that he's done. And when you're talking about a defenseman, you really want to look at what is his expected goals against per sixty goals against being how many goals are going to be scored against him, scoring chances against him, high danger chances against, and high danger goals allowed.

11:29 Speaker 2: These are all things that a good defenseman is going to try to minimize, and I will own it. I was pleasantly surprised to see that across all of those kind of key defensive metrics he's been improving, even if he's playing less ice time in those areas. To me, that means perhaps he has matured as a defenceman, that his focus has become much more clearly defensive, defensively minded, and I think he can bring to the table that plus that physicality, it's going to be huge and he's.

12:10 Speaker 1: Reliable, right, you know what you're going to get pretty much shift after shift when he takes the ice. I do recall at that time saying to myself, it's unfortunate that he's going to price himself out of duston lease.

12:25 Speaker 2: Let's face it.

12:26 Speaker 1: Every team needs a Connor Clifton type guy on the back end, someone that you know you can pretty much throw out there in a variety of scenarios, maybe not on the power play, and you pretty much know what you're going to get from him.

12:43 Speaker 2: And I don't think anybody wants to see any player for that matter, but especially a defenceman being the type that has to chase plays. And he is an aggressive defenceman. And if you look at him playing that way, that's partly where the Cliffy Hawks the idea came from, is that chaos comes from his willingness to be aggressive. And he was even more successful in Boston because this has always been a franchise that really emphasizes strong defensive structure. And then during his tenure, in particular, starting under Bruce Cassidy and Jim Montgomery, those were well oiled machines in terms of defense and having a kind of back up, a safety net that would allow an aggressive defenseman to take those chances, whether it was to go and finish a really aggressive hit or take a risk.

13:45 Speaker 2: He was able to be successful because of the system in place around him, and without that kind of system and structure in Buffalo that can really leave somebody exposed and can make mistakes happen. And so when you think about now the type of coach that Marco Sturm is, where he is expecting a lot of simple play details structure, he's not going to be He doesn't give any of the players free reign to go out and play willy nilly however they want. Whether it's David Pasternak or Mason Laurai, everyone has a job.

14:25 Speaker 2: He has a specific expectation for every single person. And I think we could see potentially a resurgence in some of that well known Cliffy hockey in the positive way because of the environment that Sturm has created. He will have some of that safety net. Now we're not there yet by any means.

14:47 Speaker 1: This is all speculation on our part, because there's no denying for whatever reason that his level of play has declined a little bit. And to your point, a lot of that could be due to the fact of teams that he's played on, right, the personnel that were already there, the type of system, the type of role. I think what happened to him in Buffalo was that there were high expectations and the threshold for him was set at such a level that you would say, good luck there. They may want you to be the big dog there, but I don't know how that's going to translate for you, And I'm not sure that it did translate for him in the manner in which he might have expected it and the Sabers organization might have expected it to translate.

15:37 Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. And I think the other part of his game, besides that physicality and that good solid defensive ability, as I mentioned, his ability to keep the goals against scoring chances, all of those things low, which is obviously ideal. Some of his less great abilities in terms of exiting with possession and pucked retrieval, those were not so awesome, although again when he was involved.

16:06 Speaker 4: To a number he had some good speed. But he has actually improved over the last three years with his exit exiting with possession, and honestly, he hasn't completely collapsed when it comes to his puck retrieval. I don't think he's gotten objectively worse in that regard. I think sometimes that's the bare minimum, and if that's not, what is ultimately part of his job imagining him partnered up with Jonathan Asperau Asby is one who is going to be more likely to be better at the puck retrieval and the exits right while he's supporting him in that role and he's doing something slightly different as Aspero's partner.

16:49 Speaker 1: I'm going to find that very curious to see how this all plays out, because whatever happens in the first seven games of the season without Charlie Mack in the line up is I'm not quite sure that's what we're going to see throughout the course of the season. Yeah, I do think he fits the bill of what cam Neely said of wanting the Bruins to be tougher to play against. And I still think Karna Clipton can bring some of that yes to the table because you know, he's not afraid to hit.

17:23 Speaker 2: Yeah, And what I find fascinating as I was thinking about it, he's not dissimilar in terms of his style of play in some of his defensive abilities compared to Andrew Peak. In terms of the good stuff. The value wasn't coming from offense. Is not like Mason Lori or even Hampus in solid two way play. It's really in keeping things calm in the back end, winning those battles and killing plays, and you can't judge him and his abilities as a defenceman by what we see from players like Charlie McVoy right, because he plays most successfully in a very particular structured role.

18:08 Speaker 2: And I'm feeling optimistic that, especially because he did not have that kind of structure around him. He did not have that kind of role assignment in Buffalo and in Pittsburgh. He just was never going to be able to perform as well as he had in his final season in Boston because he was already then a little bit behind the eight ball. So your point there, do you find it odd that Andrew Peak they were fine with him moving on, right, But now comparing a little bit the type of play. So Andrew Peak goes off to Utah at a one million dollar cap hit for one year, but we've picked up Connor Clifton for a little bit longer, for a little bit more money.

18:51 Speaker 2: What is the turning point there? What is the Bruins rationale do you think for that?

18:57 Speaker 1: I mean, I'm fine with it, and I was fine with saying goodbye to Andrew Peak because there were definitely some shortcomings that we saw defensively with Andrew Peak. Especially when things became a little bit frantic or chaotic.

19:13 Speaker 2: Yeah, now, yeah, I think there are a couple of things in Connor's favor. I don't know that they're necessarily worth more financially compared to the one million and then the two whatever, but I think it's a couple of things. That he is older as a defenseman, you mature later. You want to have somebody in your back end who can reliably kill those plays, assist with getting the puck out of his own. That's a hallmark of Storm System is get it out fast because we want to play a high transition game.

19:50 Speaker 2: I think that he can help facilitate that transition game from the back end. So his decision making I think is probably better than Andrew Peaks, not just because of the age difference and that Connor Clifton has grown up a little bit more since he was last in Boston and Andrew Peak being twenty eight and he's thirty one. And I think he's a known entity that they know very well. They know is he coachable? How can he play four different kinds of coaches? He was in Boston for two different coaches.

20:24 Speaker 2: He's gone and seen some of the others and this is me entirely speculating, But when you've been around the block and you've worked professionally, like I'm going to speak for my own experience, I know what's important. I know it's not important at this point in my career. I know what a good boss looks like and a bad boss looks like. I know how to work with different kinds of people. And you probably wanted to come home, and so you already then have somebody who has some degree of buy into the system.

20:55 Speaker 2: He knows what a good structured defensive system looks like and how he can help. That just makes it one less thing potentially that Bruin's management has to worry about in the back end, whether it's the first ten games of the season or it's March and people are getting squirrely. That's my impression. Let's call a spade a spade here too. Campus lind Home cannot seem to stay healthy any longer. You just go into now a season thinking what is going to be the next injury or when is that knee or whatever going to resurface again where he's going to be out for a significant period of time.

21:36 Speaker 2: So maybe the organization is also hedging its bets on we could likely lose this.

21:41 Speaker 1: Guy campus again for a chunk of time in the season.

21:45 Speaker 2: Yeah, and you really want somebody who can step in and knows what they're doing. We've got a lot of young guys on d these days, and that's great, but that means there's a lot of inexperience there. And at this point, Connor Clifton is an experienced veteran defenseman now, and that's incredibly valuable when you have a system that really emphasizes defense, but does.

22:11 Speaker 1: It lends yourself to giving you a lot of confidence when now we're saying Connor Clifton is a veteran defenseman, right, and we're going to be doing an episode focusing on our defensive four and our forward four groups heading into the season, and there's quite a bit too unpack when it comes to the Bruins quote unquote defensive death at this point. Yeah.

22:36 Speaker 2: I would suggest for new watchers of the game who have not seen the joys of Cliffy hockey, or even folks who don't remember, look for a player who is going to be throwing good hits and he doesn't rack up a lot of penalty minutes.

22:50 Speaker 1: So he knows unlike other members of the Bruins defensive core, he knows how to hit someone legally.

22:58 Speaker 2: Yes, and effectively exactly, And that's great. Yeah. I think what I'm expecting to see out of Connor Clifton is exactly like we said. We're going to see a high energy, We're going to see good physical play. We're going to see a player who has a strong ability to gap up and really assist in that zone exit hopefully them getting better with more of the correct personnel and getting more familiar with Sturm's system. Really trying to create a team that thrives on transition. That's what he's ultimately trying to accomplish with this Bruins team.

23:33 Speaker 2: And I think that Connor Clifton is a good addition to make that happen.

23:39 Speaker 1: And I am going to be curious to see his usage and I'm going to be curious to see how that translates in terms of the defensive structure, if they clearly want to play, and how that helps the goaltenders too.

23:55 Speaker 2: Let's face it, we relied way too much.

23:58 Speaker 1: I can't even believe I'm saying this, but we've relied way too much on our goalies last season more than I think even they might have anticipated expected.

24:09 Speaker 2: Swamon has played roughly the same number of games as other significant starters, but I guarantee you he had a lot more work to do in that amount of time.

24:17 Speaker 1: Oh yes, oh yes.

24:18 Speaker 2: And the last thing I did fail to mention I fully expect to see him doing a lot of PK work is I don't know that I would necessarily call him a PK specialist, but he's definitely one that you want to have fully engaged and used a lot on the penalty kill. And that is again something else that for most of his time in Boston and most of what we've seen in the last two decades has been something that the Bruins have particularly excelled at and in recent years have not done as well on the penalty that was.

24:50 Speaker 1: Actually quite literally killing this team a little bit of regression.

24:54 Speaker 2: I would expect to see a much improved penalty kill with Connor Clifton on Matt Unit.

25:02 Speaker 1: I think fans who are unfamiliar with Connor Clifton will likely enjoy seeing him play because I myself love to see defencemen who are physical right and do it within the realms of the rules, but I'm all for ensuring that whoever's coming in to our end of the house as to look over his shoulder to see what's coming at.

25:28 Speaker 2: Yes, exactly. Can't wait for Cliffy hockey.

25:31 Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll see how that translates and how it surfaces in the upcoming season. So with that being said, folks, thank you for listening. Please make sure you like and subscribe from more contact, and be sure to leave us a rating or a review to help other Bruins fans find us. You can also support our podcast by joining our Patreon or following us on our socials at Tape to Tape MK and on Substack at Tape to Tape m K dot substack dot com. Any closing thoughts, Go Bees, Go Bees.