Most players on any team will eventually slack off if the HC is not holding them to a standard and using discipline to maintain it. Only a few teams with the most obsessive/committed leaders can get away with a HC that doesn't do this...guys that can pick up that slack so to speak. If Granato thought guys weren't listening, there is hardly any hint that he did anything significant to address it. Talking alone isn't enough, especially with a young roster and a lame captain that might not even know just how deep they have to dig to be successful. We never saw or heard of certain players getting benched or scratched, other than a few young guys who "weren't going well" or however Granato put it. Never heard about bag skates or some equivalent, never saw Granato go ballistic during a game or otherwise publicly shame a guy who needed it. Some of this may have happened to a small extent, but if the team was full of guys not listening, then it's Granato's fault for not delivering the message effectively or taking another action to drive it home.
I totally get that the roster could be at least half full of lazy brats who don't have what it takes, but almost any group of guys that have made it to the NHL have potential to be coached and disciplined into a cohesive unit that should at least come out like they have a clue at puck drop. My own personal experiences have proven that a good coach, supervisor, team leader, etc, can take almost any group worth half a damn and make it successful to some extent, or at least functioning properly.
