It is no secret how popular podcasts have become, not only in the sports world, but for anyone who is constantly on the go and is looking for a way to learn or stay updated with their favorite hobby, sports team, or current event.
As hockey fans, podcasting has been an easy way to get expert opinions and entertaining content about the sport we love, all without missing a beat in our daily lives.
Full disclosure, I have listened to a TON of hockey podcasts (my library currently features about 40 different shows) ranging from those that cover only a specific NHL team, to those which discuss broader league topics as they make headlines.
And to be fair to everyone here, I am going to focus this list almost exclusively on podcasts that cover the entire NHL (there is one exception, you will see). These shows that center on the entire league, in my opinion, also tend to just be the ones I find most interesting as well.
With that said, and again this is just my own personal opinion, let us begin.
Number 10 – The TSN Hockey Bobcast
As the name insinuates, this podcast is hosted by TSN’s very own Bob McKenzie. McKenzie is widely regarded as the best of the best when it comes to hockey insiders, and his depth of knowledge on the NHL’s young prospects makes him a must-read, and must-listen when it comes to anything to do with the game off the ice.
The TSN Hockey Bobcast gives fans a more raw and uncut version of McKenzie that may be unfamiliar to those who only catch him on prime time. On the show, he answers listener questions and gives his opinions on what is going on around the league.
If you are one of those people who like to be in the know, it goes without saying that McKenzie is someone you want to be following. He comes across as a very genuine guy who will speak his mind even if it ruffles a few feathers, and that is certainly something to appreciate.
Number 9 – The Hockey PDOcast
This podcast, run by Vancouver-raised Dimitri Filipovic, is my top podcast for the analytically-centered hockey fans out there, and the name itself is a pun on a term used to describe the sum of a team’s shooting percentage and its save percentage.
I’ll be the first to admit that I am not someone who loves crunching numbers when it comes to hockey. But this discipline is becoming increasingly important for the sport, and as legalized gambling begins to permeate the league and player tracking is introduced, the stat community will only continue to grow.
That means good things for Filipovic, who does an excellent job incorporating numbers into his show in a way that is digestible for the average hockey fan. He also hosts an array of prominent hockey journalists and statisticians that keeps the show feeling fresh.
If you are interested in learning more about advanced hockey analytics, this article does a far better job of explaining them than I ever could. And, as goes for most of the podcasts I am reviewing, you can find the show on the podcast provider that you are most comfortable using.
Number 8 – The Full 60
The Full 60 is a podcast run by long-time hockey journalist Craig Custance. Custance got his start covering the NHL for the Atlanta Thrashers (R.I.P.), and was the national hockey writer for the Sporting News before joining ESPN in 2011.
Custance worked at ESPN for about seven years before he left to kick off The Athletic‘s Detroit branch in June 2017 where he has worked as Editor-in-Chief ever since.
Aside from hosting The Full 60, Custance also writes regular long-form pieces on a host of NHL topics.
He is also the author of one of my favorite hockey books of late Behind the Bench: Inside the Minds of Hockey’s Greatest Coaches which I reviewed a while back.
Custance is great at what he does there just no two ways about it. He takes great care to cover hockey topics from a unique angle, and on his show, he is constantly interviewing some of the greatest hockey minds around.
The show had been put behind The Athletic‘s paywall for a few months, but it looks as though Custance is going to be releasing episodes to the general public, subscription-free, once again. So make sure you give this podcast a listen.
Number 7 – ESPN on Ice
Espn on Ice, as you would guess, is ESPN’s premier hockey podcast. Hosted by hockey journalists Emily Kaplan and Greg Wyshynski, the show is what you would expect from two of the best NHL reporters out there. It is informative, and the guest selection is bolstered with a mix of current and former players along with NHL team executives and others who cover the sport.
The show is also family-friendly, unlike Wyshynski’s Puck Soup (see No.6), and the humor is light and occasionally cheesy. Its hallmark segment “Phil Kessel Loves Hotdogs” is a hilarious invention for calling out fellow media members who sometimes seem to care more about article clicks than they do about covering hockey.
All in all, this show is all you need to stay updated weekly on the NHL and it is great if you are someone that will often be listening around kids. You can tell that Greg and Emily are not only colleagues but good friends as well, and a podcast with a strong duo is infinitely more captivating.
Number 6 – Puck Soup
As mentioned above, Puck Soup is the second podcast hosted by Greg Wyshynski to make this list. On the show, Wyshynski is joined by co-hosts Ryan Lambert of Yahoo Sports and Sean McIndoe of The Athletic. All three are well-respected hockey writers that each cover the NHL for prominent competitors in the space.
It was originally unclear to me how the show would fare after former co-host Dave Lozo decided to leave the show, but the additions of Lambert and McIndoe have made it better than ever.
While Wyshynski and Lozo often had differing views when it came to various topics around the sport and league in general, McIndoe and Lambert often have nuanced opinions that allow listeners to hear topics from multiple angles as well.
The show is great, and the comedy is solid. And Nothing beats Wyshynski’s impression of Sydney Crosby. The cast often discusses movies and other topics of pop culture, so if you want strictly hockey all the time then this might not be the show for you. But if you don’t mind the occasional foray from on-ice conversation, then look no further, I have the podcast for you.
Number 5 – The Natural Hat Trick Podcast
There is perhaps no more underrated podcast on this list than The Natural Hat Trick Podcast. This show is hosted by Arizona Coyotes radio host Luke Lapinski, senior writer (covering the Coyotes) for The Athletic Arizona Craig Morgan, and Jaime Eisner who hosts a fantasy football podcast as well as his work for The Nattie Hattie.
As I mentioned before, synergy is important for me when rating a podcast. How well the hosts of the show flow with each other greatly affects its listenability. Lapinski, Morgan, and Eisner keep the show light while poking fun at each other (and the Chicago Blackhawks).
Maybe it is because this show comes from a part of the hockey world that is often an afterthought to many hockey fans, but the quality of this one is right up there with some of the best around.
The show doesn’t feature a ton of guests, but they don’t need many if I am being honest. Lapinski and Morgan work closely with the Coyotes so their insight into the league is already coming from a unique perspective.
And yes, you might hear slightly more conversation about the Coyotes than other teams, but this is certainly an NHL podcast, not a Coyotes podcast. For myself personally, I don’t mind the added Yotes talk because, as I noted, they aren’t exactly a team with a ton of national coverage.
Check this show out, I could listen to these three go back and forth with their NHL opinions all day long, I’m sure others will enjoy as well.
Number 4 – The Steve Dangle Podcast
I did allude to there being one team-specific podcast on this list, and we have finally arrived at it. The Steve Dangle Podcast is a podcast that dedicates the majority of its time to covering the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Radio host Adam Wylde steers the direction of the show that features the main talent, and man for which the show takes its name, Steve “Dangle” Glynn. Mr. Dangle attributes his fame to his hockey YouTube channel, where his unique and effervescent style has entertained Leafs fans through some of the franchise’s most difficult years.
Behind the scenes, and in front of the mic as well, is Jesse Blake. Blake keeps the show going from a technical point of view and is also a part of the talent team as well, though you will hear from him slightly less than Wylde and certainly less than Glynn.
Yes, this is a team-specific podcast, but the three flow extremely well together and the show is incredibly entertaining. Don’t get me wrong, the Maple Leafs aren’t the only thing they talk about. They go around the league regularly, but there is no denying the focus of this show.
That being said, if you don’t like the Maple Leafs, then maybe this show won’t be for you. But I was raised a Boston Bruins fan and I have a great time listening to this show weekly. So maybe give it a shot, I doubt you’ll be disappointed.
Number 3 – 31 Thoughts: The Podcast
This is yet another podcast featuring an NHL insider, and if you are familiar with his work then the title of the show is a dead giveaway as to who I am referring to. 31 Thoughts: The Podcast stars Sportsnet reporter Elliotte Friedman and is the audio adaptation of his popular written column 31 Thoughts.
The show, which is hosted by Friedman’s colleague and good friend Jeff Marek, features a less-structured style than the written column. Rather than listing off 31 thoughts about the NHL and hockey world, the show is focused more on a few important topics each episode.
Both Friedman and Marek are excellent at what they do and they work well together. Friedman’s McKenzie-like insight into the NHL keeps fans interested in what he has to say. And the show regularly features top-end guests from the hockey world, with recent episodes containing candid interviews with both Sydney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin.
The show is highly informative, family-friendly, and entertaining. It is a favorite podcast of mine and many others who love the sport of hockey.
Number 2 – Hockey Central @ Noon
This podcast stands out from all the others on this list for a few different reasons. First of all, Hockey Central @ Noon is a hockey television program produced by Sportsnet that is adapted INTO a podcast.
What does that mean? Honestly, it doesn’t mean a whole lot other than once in a while a member of the cast will do something on set visually (like wear a costume during the program) that can only be seen by people who are watching it on TV. The cast will also occasionally discuss a replay from a game the night before as they are rewatching it and podcast listeners just have to do their best to follow along.
I have waited to introduce the cast until now because that is yet another unique part of the show. The show runs five days a week during the NHL season and just recently extended its episode length from one hour to two (a nice feature of the podcast is that it cuts out TV commercials to finish in just about 90 minutes).
That being said, it is difficult to have talent available five-days a week. This is largely because the “talent” mentioned here comprises mostly of former NHL players and Executives along with Sportsnet‘s own hosts. And depending on which teams are playing where on any given night, cast members might be off covering a game in-person. Others might only just be part-timers who spend much of their time outside of Toronto (where the show is filmed) or the very least outside of a TV studio.
But on any given episode the cast ranges from the previously-mentioned host Jeff Marek and his colleague David Amber, to former players Colby Armstrong and Nick Kypreos, to former NHL Executives Gord Stellick and Brian Burke.
And the reason this show is such a great listen, outside of the fact that its cast has years of experience inside the league, is that whenever something important happens across the hockey world, it always seems like Sportsnet has first dibs. That means important players, coaches, and executives often come on Hockey Central @ Noon before they go anywhere else.
So if there is something worth talking about from a game the night before involving a player or anyone else in the league, there is a solid chance that if they plan on speaking to the media at length about the subject, the first place you will hear from them is the next day at noon on Sportsnet or NHL Network depending on if you live in Canada or the United States.
The show is great for everyone, I wrote in a previous post that it may be better consumed by those who really follow the NHL closely. But I think casual fans will get plenty out of the show as well.
Number 1 – Spittin Chiclets
It is undeniable to anyone who follows the NHL close enough that Spittin Chiclets is the most popular podcast in the hockey world. That fact alone can be largely attributed to this show being able to accomplish the one thing every other podcast on this list fails (for the most part) to do: get an authentic look into the life of NHL players.
Spittin Chiclets is a Barstool Sports podcast, but I say that with an important distinction. I am admittedly NOT the biggest fan of the Barstool brand but while this podcast is under the sports giant’s umbrella, and does share some of the same raunchy comedy that many have come to associate with it, Spittin Chiclets walks its own path.
The show was started by Brian McGonagle (more commonly known as Rear Admiral or simply RA) and former NHLer Ryan Whitney (not to be confused with Ray Whitney, another NHLer with whom he shares no relation).
But it is safe to say that the show skyrocketed in popularity when another former NHLer and notorious face-puncher Paul Bissonnette joined the show. I won’t go into crazy detail about the cast itself but I will link back to an article I previously wrote covering this show in particular.
As a side note, every show that I have previously written about will have a link at the top of its section where you can read that individual post.
Just know that if you are someone looking to get a pretty authentic perspective of the game from the guys who have made a career out of it, then this show is a must-listen.
But as I noted, the show is notorious for its crude humor so keep that in mind when listening. For others, the detailed and raunchy stories, many of which have come from Bissonnette himself, are the reason they tune in week after week for episodes that often range over two hours long.
And if a podcast is able to put together episodes of that length with relatively minimal blowback from its audience, then you know it must be a show worth listening to.
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