- 6/2/2025
Florida Panthers Center and Leroy's favorite player on the roster Evan Rodrigues joins the show fresh off of his first goal of the post season! As he gears up for a rematch against the Edmonton Oilers he explains the physicality this team plays with and the amount of accountability between teammates. Evan discusses his ridiculous embellishment call and how shocked he was to be called for! We finally get a description of Paul Maurice's "Sweet Saucin" comments and its secret meaning.
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00:00Hey Tobin and Leroy here with you on 560 WQAM very excited to talk to our next guest as the
00:07Florida Panthers getting ready for their third straight trip to the Stanley Cup final and one
00:12of the champs joining us here Evan Rodriguez got his first goal of the postseason in the Cats
00:17clincher against the Hurricanes Evan thanks for the time man really appreciate it anytime guys
00:22thanks for having me what uh what what level of honor is it when you get the puck for the puck
00:27board that looks it's one of our favorite things every time they uh they you guys are around the
00:31locker room someone whoever won the last game has to give it to the next guy so when you get the puck
00:36like how where does that go as far as in-season honors for you from your teammates uh yeah it's
00:41pretty cool because it comes from your teammates like you said it's something that um your teammates
00:46recognize uh and it's a cool little tradition right we we did it last year and uh again this year and
00:52um you don't always want to help contribute to a win right so um being acknowledged by your by your
00:59teammates is special and um you know each guy uh each guy will get there how how hard is it because
01:07i we've seen the transition from winning the president's cup but not performing well in the playoffs
01:16to kind of changing how everything is done more physical more defensive um how is that transition
01:26for like guys that come in or even for guys that were here because like you spend your career playing
01:34a certain way and then it's just thrown you know thrown out the door and you have to kind of reinvent
01:40yourself yeah i think the best way i can put it is you don't really have a choice um and you know
01:49it's you go through the regular season and it's still a little bit different than what our game is
01:55in the playoffs and once the playoffs come if you don't play our way and if you don't do the things
02:00that are necessary uh to winning it's not really the coaches that are on you it's the players on the
02:06bench it's the guys next to you that are like we don't do that here that's right that's unacceptable
02:12like that don't do it again and um when your teammates are holding you accountable it's a
02:17different feeling and you know even the coach or or whoever else and um so yeah like i said it you
02:26don't really have a choice or you know everyone's kind of on you and everyone will be like that's
02:30that just isn't it so you learn quickly and and you just adapt because you know at the end of the
02:36day you you recognize and realize that it you know it it's what you need to do to be successful and
02:43um i think everyone recognizes that pretty quickly and then hops right on board it's a it's a weird
02:48dynamic because i played football and a guy who was not tough and physical never just turned on a switch
02:59and became tough and physical and the style of play that i've seen now versus a couple of years ago
03:08is so different and i always wondered did you guys always have it in you or it was just something like
03:16you said like you have to adapt uh i'd say a little bit of both i would say the guys that we have on our
03:23team all have that edge um but at the same time a lot of it's mental right like you even if you think
03:30you don't have it you the team the guys that you know have been here and and i guess lead in that
03:37category kind of drag you right into the fight right like if if you got the other four guys on the team
03:43going into a fight right you're not going to be you're not going to be the one guy standing off to
03:46the side because again like i said earlier your team's going to let you know like that's not
03:50acceptable so um you know we have leaders in that category that you know are we have guys that are
03:57more physical and uh you know maybe meaner than others but um everyone pulls on the rope right
04:04everyone does what they can everyone um you know lays their hits when they have them and
04:10um it's almost like a it's a team thing right when it's over and over and over again the the other
04:18team starts to feel it and it might not be the biggest hits or it might not be you know the the
04:23meanest but when you're getting hit over and over and over again it wears on you and i can imagine it's
04:28the same thing in football and any sport it's the toll eventually catches up to you well speaking of
04:35toughness uh how crazy was it that you got an embellishment call for basically getting torpedoed
04:41into the boards like that was one of the craziest things i think i've ever seen in my life like
04:44when when you were going did you even realize like what was happening when that got called on you
04:49i had no idea i uh i've mentioned this before but i um i went off the ice so i just figured um
04:58you know they got a roughing or matching matching roughings between whoever was out there and
05:03um you know it's funny in between the second and third period ecchi said like that was the
05:08craziest call i've ever seen and i was a little bit pissed off i didn't i kind of ignored him a
05:13little bit and just didn't acknowledge like what he said and then after the game uh i got a text
05:17from my brother being like yeah that was a crazy embellishing and i that's when i found out that i got
05:21an embellishing call yeah like didn't even know how to react because i couldn't like i was i could not
05:29believe it like i couldn't fathom that that could even be possible is it literally though
05:36it's impossible to call roughing on one guy an embellishment on the other it's either one or the
05:42other yeah i i it's one of those like i'm just gonna move on from because i can't even i can't
05:49even explain it to you like i couldn't even tell you like oh this is what he saw or like this is
05:54what maybe like this is what like maybe i could see it through his eyes but i just like i i got
06:00nothing for you you have nothing to explain it it was it was it was it was crazy to me i i i just
06:06it still is one of those things that's going to be like you'll we'll look back on uh on the dvd of
06:10this season and be like oh my god i can't believe that that was a moment yeah uh one of the things
06:15that's crazy though evan like you do finally get your first goal but you guys have so many guys who
06:20have scored but you were amongst like the group who didn't and it didn't seem like you belong i
06:25know you have a ton of assists in the postseason run so were you getting any uh any any talk from
06:31your teammates because you're usually like piling it in into the net during a postseason run how crazy
06:36was it that it took that long to to get one to finally go for you no it didn't bother me at all i
06:41don't think even the guys on i'm i'm gonna be honest i don't even think the guys on the team knew i
06:45didn't have a goal yet like it was it's just uh we couldn't be more of a team in that sense of the
06:52word like it doesn't matter who's scoring who you know who's getting points at the end of the day it's
06:57just about wins right so um personally obviously you always want to contribute you always want to
07:01you know put the puck in the net health team win but um you know like i said before i was saving
07:07i'm saving them for the david ready for we're ready for an avalanche yeah exactly so just just
07:13stockpiling them and um yeah obviously nice to score though and contribute to that one the way you
07:19guys play though um it's almost like the way even when paul explains games the scoring is a product
07:29of doing all the other things necessary to win so there's not as much importance put on scoring
07:36even though you need to score to win yeah i think it the the biggest message i think and and
07:43the biggest takeaway is that we're all in the nhl for a reason right we all have the talent we all
07:50have the ability we all got to this spot because we have talent so when you focus on you know the
07:56little things and the defense and you know the things that are more mentally hard than you know
08:03actual talent um the talent will just come out when it has to come out right the goal scoring ability
08:10the playmaking ability those things will come out just because it's what we've done our whole lives
08:14we know how to do it it's the reason why we're here and so when you put the mental focus onto you know
08:20like you said the defense the the physical you know nature of the game the hitting those sort of
08:27things that aren't just natural that take you know focus and and attention the rest of it just takes
08:34care of itself and i think that's you know that's where we're having our success is that we can you
08:40know put our our mental capacity into the the hard things and um you know the fun and the goal scoring
08:47the playmaking that's just that's when your natural instincts your natural talents just take care of
08:53themselves and and uh you know shine through how have you found this season for your team uh being
09:00the hunted like being the team that everybody wants to chase down some people are calling you the
09:05standard right now but like what is it like bringing that uh that in the back of your head to the rink
09:10every single night instead of you know redemption getting your first championship and trying to get to
09:15this big accomplishment is is it a different mental exercise to to bring it again and knowing that
09:21everybody's got them for you with their best i think in the regular season more than the playoffs
09:25the regular season you know it's it's a long year it's a bit of a grind um like you said every team is
09:33now bringing their best because they know that's kind of what they need to to beat us and um you know
09:39it's i'd be lying if i said it's not you know extremely hard to bring it every single night right like
09:45it's it's a long season and um yeah but but once it comes to the playoffs i think you know that's when
09:52you're seeing every team every player's best night in night out um and in that token it's you know we've
10:01been we've been fine in that regard it hasn't been that too much of a challenge it's um something i think
10:06we've embraced more and and uh you know we'll look to continue to do that the rest of the way
10:12do you guys laugh when other teams come to you and say we're gonna try to be as physical as you
10:18and you go you're not that guy right because it kind of happened early in the carolina series where
10:25you know i've known carolina to be just extremely fast on skates like just from one end to the other
10:32whatever then all of a sudden now we got fisticuffs all the time we're like that's not your thing dude
10:37that for the panthers that's tuesday yeah i think you know that's where the experience and
10:44doing it all regular season long that this is where you see the payoff right this is where
10:49we can you know withstand that and and do it over and over and over again and and it'd be normal for
10:56us you know on the playoffs a lot of you know even when i was on different teams before this you can
11:01get up for a period or two and be physical and hard even a game you can do it for 60 minutes but to do
11:06it night in and night out when you haven't done it before is extremely challenging it's i've had the
11:12like i said i've had the experiences on other teams doing that and i think that's one of our biggest
11:18um you know advantages i would say is that we've had the experience of doing it it's what we
11:26preached all year long from the start of training camp it's what we did last year it's what the guys
11:30that were here did the year before and um it's just more natural to us i believe and and i think
11:36that's you know a big reason uh a big part of our success a couple more randos before we get you out
11:42of here evan uh in the last win you guys uh the the team put out a mic'd up and paul marie said at
11:50one point you guys are sweet saucing it tonight boys what the hell does that mean what is sweet
11:54saucing it uh he makes fun of us when we try to get cute with the puck and you know make plays and
12:00and be fancy so that was someone probably threw a you know a nice head high saucer passed across the
12:07ice and um that was his subtle that was his subtle not so subtle way of saying hey enough
12:13that's you're done so it wasn't a compliment no well it was a it was a it was a compliment but also
12:22there was a uh there was a hidden meaning of hey that's your like that that isn't us and that was
12:30your one and now stop is is that is he like that with everything because you know when he talks to the
12:36media he kind of has a sly way of making his point where everybody gets it but then he'll smile or
12:43stay in this one tone of voice but then you'll hear him on this on like in the box yelling at you guys
12:50and i'm like oh he's a different dude yeah he's he's really it's one of his that i found over my two
12:57years here is he's really good at controlling or i guess getting the message across like whatever his
13:04message is um he has a way about him whether it be in a sarcastic way or whether it be sometimes
13:11like he almost knows what we need right so when we need you know a uh what's gonna say it um well
13:19we need a strong and yeah when he when your mother f's you you know like sometimes we get the message
13:26but then like you just mentioned like sometimes they'll say something extremely sarcastic where we
13:32all kind of get a chuckle out of it but then it's like hey guys like let's go but you know we get
13:36so he's uh he does a really good job of knowing what we need and what our team needs and um yeah he's
13:45he's a fun coach to play for that's for sure my favorite my favorite game i think you guys end up
13:50losing a game or something and he goes you know what i i like a lot of the things that we did
13:56it's not like we're gonna come up here tomorrow and have a punitive skate
13:59so i've been wondering what the hell is a punitive skate
14:04you know i think i'm wondering with you i don't know i'm guessing we're not coming out here and
14:11having like a i i maybe like being all down and upset we're gonna go out there we're gonna get
14:17his big message is uh you know we win or we learn type deal so if you win and you're feeling good you
14:22get back to work but if not you learn from it and you get right back out there right you learn from it
14:26you you take the things you change the things you need to change and you just get back to work and
14:32um you know there's no we obviously have a good setup here with brand new practice facility you
14:38know beautiful weather this that and the other thing we're all living uh you know living our dream
14:43in a great place but at the end of the day when when we come to the rink and it's between the hours
14:48of whatever it is nine to one or however long we're here till it's we put the work boots on and
14:53um we put our work in and then we get to go enjoy ourselves so i'm sure that was uh that was part of
15:00his uh part of his message was that we're gonna get back to work evan rodriguez thanks for giving us
15:05so much time man best of luck safe travels up to edmonton will you be making any dq runs in edmonton
15:10is that part of your go-to dessert will you be part of the dq crew i haven't been part of the dq crew
15:16but i've seen some things online that people are already uh mapping out where they are so
15:20what part of canada are you from pardon what part of canada are you i'm from toronto so my wife is
15:27from sherbrooke okay yeah yeah so that small little town had a dairy queen dairy queen brazier because
15:34they had hamburgers so so i'm not gonna put any names out there i'll let you guys figure it out but
15:40there is someone on this team that swears that the bacon cheeseburger dq is the best fast food burger
15:47okay so it's gotta be micola i am not i'm not putting i'm not giving you the name but there is
15:55a human being on the florida panthers that lives by the dairy queen that's crazy that's a crazy take
16:02that's that's what i'm leaving you guys with all right hey best of luck this series evan thanks for
16:07spend so much time with us today thanks for having me appreciate it guys