TSN: McKenzie: Woodcroft Assigned to Bakersfields

[SomeDudeOTI]

What net front presence? Lucic and Maroon were off to the side every play. I don't know if the Oilers scored on a deflection all year, either.

Then Maroon goes to NJ and the first thing he does is stand directly in front of the goalie on the PP. Must've just been something he remembered on the plane out of Edmonton, I guess.

This doesn't get mentioned nearly enough and is an obviously sign of coaching.

 

[KMart27]

In general I agree with most of what has been said (haven't read all 9 pages though to be fair). The Oiler coaching staff definitely needed changes and the main assistant coaches are out so that is a positive. Bakersfield also needed a coaching change so good that it was at least recognized.

The one thing I disagree with is the attitude that only firings are acceptable. Honestly, I would have wanted Woodcroft fired and I can't say I am confident that he will be a good coach for Bakersfield but I can really only judge him based on the PP. I would rather have him turn out to be a great coach in Bakersfield than it happen somewhere else because we were vengeful.

 

[rboomercat90]

You are obviously entitled to your opinion but I think your view is being obscured by your dedication to the faulty coaching narrative.

My frustration this entire season was about the lack of execution and all too often the disengagement of far too many players.
Those realities are coach killers. Without an engaged player who can execute a system there is nothing a coach can do.
Nothing.

For me its so incredibly difficult to assess coaching when I see so many consistent fundamental errors by so many of the same key players over the entire season. I think that there were maybe 4 portions of the season where the team started to focus, work hard and execute properly and then it would disappear a few games later.
very frustrating to watch.

Doesn’t a lack of execution by the players for most of the season ultimately fall on coaching though? That it lasted all season shows Mclellan had no answers for it, that he couldn’t get through to the players. Isn’t that enough reason to need to make a change right there? What happens if there’s another “lack of execution” problem next year? Why should we expect Mclellan will have the answers then? Are you going to start trading all the players because they aren’t performing for the coach? I think “lack of execution” for the entire season is the G-rated version of the players quit on the coach. I think we’re wasting another season trying to prove this isn’t the case. Not only that but we might be wasting a year of prospect development by having Woodcroft running the Condors. We’re doubling down on a bad hand.

 

[guymez]

Doesn’t a lack of execution by the players for most of the season ultimately fall on coaching though? That it lasted all season shows Mclellan had no answers for it, that he couldn’t get through to the players. Isn’t that enough reason to need to make a change right there? What happens if there’s another “lack of execution” problem next year? Why should we expect Mclellan will have the answers then? Are you going to start trading all the players because they aren’t performing for the coach? I think “lack of execution” for the entire season is the G-rated version of the players quit on the coach. I think we’re wasting another season trying to prove this isn’t the case. Not only that but we might be wasting a year of prospect development by having Woodcroft running the Condors. We’re doubling down on a bad hand.

I think you are cherry picking a little bit here. You never bother to mention the reasons for the lack of execution which I have detailed multiple times in this thread alone.

Are you trying to tell me that your viewing of this team didnt reveal lazy half hearted play more often than not? Are you suggesting that key players on this team weren't disengaged from the commitment it takes to win on a consistent basis?

The major difference between this season and last season was player commitment to winning. That was obvious from game #2 of the season IMO. I have been posting about this since about game 15 once the pattern became obvious. That leads to poor execution and mounting losses.
I posted that they would miss the playoffs if it continued. Thats exactly what happened.
I am not saying that for a pat on the back....I am saying it because it was so blatantly obvious to anyone who could step out of their anger and disappointment long enough to objectively watch the team.

As for Woodcroft going to the Conders...I strongly suspect your opinion would have been entirely different had this happened before the season started.
I mean in order to maintain the narrative that coaching is the biggest issue you have to suggest that Woodcroft wont do a good job down there.
I get it.

 

[nexttothemoon]

Oilers D combined had 2 PP goals and 12 assists on the PP all season long.

That's 1 PP point every 6 games from the D. Pathetic is the only word to describe that type of production from an entire defensive group on the PP.

Bad coaching, poor personnel, bad luck, bad jersey design... whatever it was it sucked to have that type of performance from the D and that's the #1 area to improve.

 

[5 Mins 4 Ftg]

Two or three assisant coaching spots open and I haven't seen Coffey's name mentioned as a possiblity.

Today in an interview with Chiarelli he confirmed Coffey will be back as skills coach and was scouting defencemen in the OHL playoffs. TMac in an interview also said an assistant coach might not have any pro hockey experience, clearly talking about Coffey.

 

[VainGretzky]

It seems like Katz is fed up paying for coaches who get axed , I can see Woodcroft gone as soon as his contract ends , also probably a good reason Tmac is still here

 

[Del Preston]

Today in an interview with Chiarelli he confirmed Coffey will be back as skills coach and was scouting defencemen in the OHL playoffs. TMac in an interview also said an assistant coach might not have any pro hockey experience, clearly talking about Coffey.

Hopefully that is McLellan's choice and it wasn't forced on him again.

 

[Mowzie]

Still think it would be nice to have a younger players coach. Hendricks, Smyth, Oates?

 

[MessierII]

Oilers D combined had 2 PP goals and 12 assists on the PP all season long.

That's 1 PP point every 6 games from the D. Pathetic is the only word to describe that type of production from an entire defensive group on the PP.

Bad coaching, poor personnel, bad luck, bad jersey design... whatever it was it sucked to have that type of performance from the D and that's the #1 area to improve.

It’s ridiculously bad. We also had the least pp opportunities of any team in a long time as well but I agree scoring from the back end is a much bigger concern to me than the wings.

 

[Ragss]

It’s ridiculously bad. We also had the least pp opportunities of any team in a long time as well but I agree scoring from the back end is a much bigger concern to me than the wings.

Not quite. In the entire history of the NHL the 17-18 Oilers set the all-time record for least PP opportunities in an 82 games season. All time. All f***ing time.

 

[nexttothemoon]

It’s ridiculously bad. We also had the least pp opportunities of any team in a long time as well but I agree scoring from the back end is a much bigger concern to me than the wings.

I actually think those PP pts by the Oilers D is the worst in modern history.

I took a quick look at the other pathetically bad PP teams going all the way back to the 1972/73 season (looking at all non-lockout shortened seasons) and I could only find one other instance in those 45+ years of hockey where a team had their dmen score less than the Oilers who scored 14 PP pts on the PP all season long.

The 1972/73 expansion NYI dmen apparently scored just 1 goal and 10 pts on the PP that season in a 78 game schedule. So 1 team in the last 46 years was worse than the Oilers D on the PP... and just barely worse at that.

Those Oilers numbers are not just BAD... they are absolutely, amazingly, horrendously, horribly BAD and the fact that no other team in modern NHL history has done worse menas that massive changes have to be made to both the coaching and player personnel.


Interestingly... in the entry draft after that 72/73 season the Isles selected left shot dman Denis Potvin #1 overall and he helped turn that PP around for the Isles and they eventually became one of the best PP teams in NHL history by the late 70's.

Hopefully history repeats itself with a certain left shot dman falling into the Oilers laps at #1 this season.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Teams quickly learned that they no longer had to respect the Klefbom shot, and then after Xmas the net front presence of Lucic. Maroon even struggled in that spot. It didn't help that Draisaitl fell too much in love with that low angle shot and McDavid didn't try to shoot until February.

Nonetheless, the coaches are responsible for trying to force the pass for the Letestu one-timer for way too long.

The player tendencies would be due to troubles in the PP scheme. Its a simplistic spread, and fairly stationary PP. They don't appear to have many set pieces or variations. Judging from on ice play you wouldn't know that they even work sets and schemes in practice. So that the players end up making it up on their own and going to the collective well on what has worked before.

My own take is so glad to be done of Woodcroft. Pity he's still in the org at all but that's the way here. At least I don't have to imagine the Oilers players rolling their eyes everytime Woodcroft is diagramming a play or giving instruction; "This is net, put puck in net, simple right, positive thinking guys, get out there and light the lamp."

 

[Soul8]

It just occurred to me that it is completely possible that Woodcroft might improve without Tmac on the bench with him...weird realization.

 

[McDNicks17]

Today in an interview with Chiarelli he confirmed Coffey will be back as skills coach and was scouting defencemen in the OHL playoffs. TMac in an interview also said an assistant coach might not have any pro hockey experience, clearly talking about Coffey.

There's a rumor over on Reddit(although more of a heard from a friend of a friend type) that said they might be looking at Manny Viveiros as an assistant. He's the Head Coach of the Swift Current Broncos.

He technically has pro hockey experience since he coached in Austria/Germany for a while, but maybe McLellan was talking more in a North American pro experience way.

 

[rboomercat90]

It seems like Katz is fed up paying for coaches who get axed , I can see Woodcroft gone as soon as his contract ends , also probably a good reason Tmac is still here

His contract ran out this season.

 

[Burnt Biscuits]

Today in an interview with Chiarelli he confirmed Coffey will be back as skills coach and was scouting defencemen in the OHL playoffs. TMac in an interview also said an assistant coach might not have any pro hockey experience, clearly talking about Coffey.

I don't have an issue with a coach not having pro hockey experience, a decent number of coaches successfully jumped directly from junior or college hockey to the NHL level and do fairly well. While Coffey has coached, he's coached at a lower level than the CHL or NCAA and I'm not comfortable having him in anything other than a niche role, like he presently has and in that niche role I think he can do well, he is an astute individual, just lacking the experience to be taking on a more prominent role.


--------------------------
My thoughts on the moves as a whole-

• Todd McLellan staying - I'm ok with him staying, I believe he is a good coach, not a great coach and has some short-comings, but I do think he is good at developing players and his general 5 on 5 strategy tends to be successful. I'm not inclined to put a lot of blame on him for the special teams, coaching an NHL team is a big job with many 12-14 hour days, taking on all the assistant coaches duties on top of the head coaching duties isn't a realistic ask; though he had a big hand in bringing these assistants with him so he's obviously on thin ice.
• Jim Johnson departing- Happy to see him go, PK was awful and I'm not sure he was doing a great job managing the D either.
• Ian Herbers departing- Kinda ambivalent cause I don't know him well enough to know how he contributed to the group and you so rarely see him since he's always in the press box, but my gut says we can probably find someone better for his role.
• Jay Woodcroft demoted/promoted to AHL head coach- Seems like a very bad move to me, I'm not inclined to believe in his ability to handle the role and this is the second time in a row where we've put a head coaches side-kick into being the go to guy in the AHL (Gerry Fleming being Todd Nelson's sidekick). Many career coaches who I suspect could do the job better or a CHL head coach from a good program who wants to step into pro hockey. Just based on his demeanor he seems like the kind of coach a lot of players would be comfortable tuning out, I'm hoping it turns out well not for his sake, but the well being of the team and our prospects.
  
• Gerry Fleming being fired- Happy to let him go, wouldn't say he was truly awful, but definitely underwhelming and I don't think he was getting the best out of what he had there, despite not having the best roster to work with in the first place.

Now for the general assumptions-

I haven't head anything about Dustin Schwartz which makes me think he is staying, that's a bad move IMO he's every bit as deserving of being fired as any other assistant coach and even if you don't want to blame him for Cam's poor play, basically every back-up goalie comes here and gets progressively worse, and he didn't sound the alarm bells that Brossoit wasn't NHL ready leaving us without a capable back-up to start the season.

If we land Trent Yawney, that's a very solid pick-up, his resume seems strong and him and McLellan have a had a good working relationship in the past. Glen Gulutzan to me is just kind of meh, feel a bit odd that he's just been bouncing around the west coast Canadian teams, I have no reason to doubt him as an assistant, but I hope we overlook him as the next head coach if we decide to fire McLellan at a later date. Paul MacLean, I don't feel the fit is right and I don't think he's the right guy to get more out of young guys, but he's very experienced, I just realized how old he was, I thought he was still in his mid-50's, not 60 years old, given his age he might be willing to take on a role similar to Herbers.

 

[Ritchie Valens]

It just occurred to me that it is completely possible that Woodcroft might improve without Tmac on the bench with him...weird realization.

I'm all for giving the guy a chance in Bakersfield. If he prides on developing players, then he will let the prospects play, in theory anyways. From what I recall, that was the biggest gripe with Fleming...played the vets way too much, giving them prime minutes and power play time over the prospects.

Another realization...I guess Mclellan isn't as tied to these guys as we thought. Lots of posters, myself included believed they were a package deal. They can be detached from each other!!

 

[McShogun99]

We can put a lot of the blame on the coaching and rightfully so but to me the majority of the blame for this last season goes to PC and the goaltending. Everyone knew what we needed on the roster last off season and he addressed none of it. Talbot/Brossoit were so bad to start the season but PC didn’t try to improve the backup spot until it was to late. We could have had Pickard or Subban for free.

 

[nexttothemoon]

I don't have an issue with a coach not having pro hockey experience, a decent number of coaches successfully jumped directly from junior or college hockey to the NHL level and do fairly well. While Coffey has coached, he's coached at a lower level than the CHL or NCAA and I'm not comfortable having him in anything other than a niche role, like he presently has and in that niche role I think he can do well, he is an astute individual, just lacking the experience to be taking on a more prominent role.


--------------------------
My thoughts on the moves as a whole-

• Todd McLellan staying - I'm ok with him staying, I believe he is a good coach, not a great coach and has some short-comings, but I do think he is good at developing players and his general 5 on 5 strategy tends to be successful. I'm not inclined to put a lot of blame on him for the special teams, coaching an NHL team is a big job with many 12-14 hour days, taking on all the assistant coaches duties on top of the head coaching duties isn't a realistic ask; though he had a big hand in bringing these assistants with him so he's obviously on thin ice.
• Jim Johnson departing- Happy to see him go, PK was awful and I'm not sure he was doing a great job managing the D either.
• Ian Herbers departing- Kinda ambivalent cause I don't know him well enough to know how he contributed to the group and you so rarely see him since he's always in the press box, but my gut says we can probably find someone better for his role.
• Jay Woodcroft demoted/promoted to AHL head coach- Seems like a very bad move to me, I'm not inclined to believe in his ability to handle the role and this is the second time in a row where we've put a head coaches side-kick into being the go to guy in the AHL (Gerry Fleming being Todd Nelson's sidekick). Many career coaches who I suspect could do the job better or a CHL head coach from a good program who wants to step into pro hockey. Just based on his demeanor he seems like the kind of coach a lot of players would be comfortable tuning out, I'm hoping it turns out well not for his sake, but the well being of the team and our prospects.
  
• Gerry Fleming being fired- Happy to let him go, wouldn't say he was truly awful, but definitely underwhelming and I don't think he was getting the best out of what he had there, despite not having the best roster to work with in the first place.

Now for the general assumptions-

I haven't head anything about Dustin Schwartz which makes me think he is staying, that's a bad move IMO he's every bit as deserving of being fired as any other assistant coach and even if you don't want to blame him for Cam's poor play, basically every back-up goalie comes here and gets progressively worse, and he didn't sound the alarm bells that Brossoit wasn't NHL ready leaving us without a capable back-up to start the season.

If we land Trent Yawney, that's a very solid pick-up, his resume seems strong and him and McLellan have a had a good working relationship in the past. Glen Gulutzan to me is just kind of meh, feel a bit odd that he's just been bouncing around the west coast Canadian teams, I have no reason to doubt him as an assistant, but I hope we overlook him as the next head coach if we decide to fire McLellan at a later date. Paul MacLean, I don't feel the fit is right and I don't think he's the right guy to get more out of young guys, but he's very experienced, I just realized how old he was, I thought he was still in his mid-50's, not 60 years old, given his age he might be willing to take on a role similar to Herbers.

Well thought out and I generally agree with all that and I think the fact that goaltending sewered this team as badly as any aspect this season means the goaltending coaches should likely get turfed out as well. Hard to separate the goalies performances from the goalie coaches that are supposed to be helping train/help them preform at their best... so who is most to blame? The fact that Talbot seemed to always be asleep at the wheel in so many games though doesn't align with a goalie coach that is helping his goalies stay focussed and play at their best right from the start of games. It got to be a running joke how many times the goalie would let in a goal on the 1st shot of the game which has to be deflating for the entire team.

I will say though that even though I think McLellan is a decent/good coach...I didn't like his lack of "passion" on the bench this year... for lack of a better word. He just seemed resigned to the shitty season and even when crap reffing calls went against him... he never really seemed to get animated or show some anger.

Now most will say that it's a good thing to have a coach that's calm and collected... but I think that can go too far as well. If the coach looks like a stick in the mud that rarely if ever gets passionate or animated when his team is getting shafted... I think players sense that as well and think these games don't mean much if the coach can't even raise his level of engagement past the level of sticking an extra piece of gum in his mouth.

 

[nexttothemoon]

I'm all for giving the guy a chance in Bakersfield. If he prides on developing players, then he will let the prospects play, in theory anyways. From what I recall, that was the biggest gripe with Fleming...played the vets way too much, giving them prime minutes and power play time over the prospects.

Another realization...I guess Mclellan isn't as tied to these guys as we thought. Lots of posters, myself included believed they were a package deal. They can be detached from each other!!

I think TM knew heads had to roll after that crappy season... especially with how poorly the special teams played which is considered to be the domain of the assistant coaches.

They couldn't just roll into next season with the same staff in all positions and "hope for the best"... fans/media and anyone else with a brain would see that as idiocy to expect much different results with the same coaching personnel in place again... even though a rebound from those atrocious levels likely takes place regardless.

If MacLellan stood his ground and refused to have any assistants turfed... my guess is he'd be out the door as well.

 

[Drivesaitl]

I'm all for giving the guy a chance in Bakersfield. If he prides on developing players, then he will let the prospects play, in theory anyways. From what I recall, that was the biggest gripe with Fleming...played the vets way too much, giving them prime minutes and power play time over the prospects.

Another realization...I guess Mclellan isn't as tied to these guys as we thought. Lots of posters, myself included believed they were a package deal. They can be detached from each other!!

With the season that just transpired and worst possible PP with McD and Drai on it there was simply no choice. Given how long it took to confirm even McLellan still had a job its likely that it was staged as no choice.
As in "these are our terms, do you want to stay coaching the Oilers Todd or not" I think anything but an inconceivably bad PP and Woodcroft would still be here. This was not a typical situation. McLellan had a Sophies choice to make. But he probably said "but can dear woody please coach in Bakersfield then"

This is the kind of Oilers org jam that you almost expect it would cook up. Soft landings for all, nary ever a bruised ego in sight.

 

[Crude]

This is the kind of Oilers org jam that you almost expect it would cook up. Soft landings for all, nary ever a bruised ego in sight.

Is this really a trend? Maybe for some OBC stuff, but for coaches certainly not; we literally had a coach fired over Skype.

 

[VainGretzky]

His contract ran out this season.

Wrong he had a year remaining

 

[SomeDudeOTI]

Wrong he had a year remaining

You're correct, nice to get that cleared up too, I've heard several times that he was up this year as well.

Here's a fairly decent article I found, nothing new but a good summary of the current situation. Amusingly it's from Shelbyville.

Edmonton Oilers fire pair of assistant coaches, reassign another to AHL