Simmonds touched on a number of off-the-ice topics including some in-depth discussion on pranks that he's been apart of over his career.
"We're in Washington DC and Matt Greene cut my shoe in half. And I don't think he wanted to cut my shoe in half," Simmonds began, talking about the best prank that's ever been pulled on him. "He was trying to cut Kyle Calder's shoe in half but I was sitting beside him. So I come back and I'm a rookie right and I go to put my shoe on. I got half a shoe on and at this point I had to go to Fort Dupont Arena because I was doing something with Donald Brashear there and the whole organization there and I'm walking down the street and I'm like guys I got like I gotta go to do something right now and I've got half a shoe.
"So luckily as it was my first year in NHL I had a couple dollars in the bank. So I went across the street and bought a new pair of shoes in the guys. They laughed at me I think for two years straight after that. It was so funny."
Simmonds also talked about life in the NHL today, including the card games the players play on the team plane.
"We sit at the card table. It's PK, myself, Sami (Vatanen) and Taylor. I'm not doing too well right now. Sami and Halsey are actually doing pretty well. I don't think PK's won at all either so we might have to switch the seats up here. But yeah, we play cards. We play seven up seven down or snarples," Simmonds began.
The forward was asked more about snarples and what it was.
"Snarples is a Western Canadian game. Sami knows how to play snarples. It has been going on through this league for as long as I've known," he began. "You get dealt five cards, you have to call how many you want to take. I want to take two tricks, I'll call two. Then everyone has a chance to go over two but you can't call two you've got to go three or four or five. If that rides, then I get to call the suit. Then I'd do any suit but if I call spades, everyone has to play.
"If you don't get what you call, you punt so you go minus-five points."
Another topic touched on was Simmonds' first game in the NHL, which was against the Sharks about 12 years ago.
"We were playing the San Jose Sharks at the Shark Tank. I remember my line started but I didn't start obviously, you know, you got those rookie jitters, right? They don't want to put you on the ice at that point," Simmonds noted. "But I just remember going into the corner, first Joe Thornton and thinking I had the puck and thinking I was getting the puck and then it was you don't even want to know what happened."
Simmonds chuckled.
Ultimately he came up with the puck and then I tried to strong stick Patty Marleau and he kind of just like like forearm shivered me off and I was like, all right, this is NHL.
"I'm not playing in junior anymore against 16 year old kids, you know?"
