News Article: Andre Savard interview

[Sorinth]

They gave him everything on a silver platter. He never had to earn anything.

He was given the starter spot with Hamilton in the playoffs despite the fact Halak got goalie of the year in the AHL that year. You can't just push players who are performing aside like this. It's not right. It gives a player the wrong idea that they're entitled to things. But then he went ahead and had a great playoffs so they couldn't keep him there and have him play a full season in the AHL like they should have.

Then, he had a good rookie year sharing duties with Huet so ... they traded the #1 goalie at the deadline and made him start in the playoffs without a safety net... again the spot was handed to him on a silver platter. Predictably, crap hit the fan and it became obvious Price had been thrown in the fire against Philly. Instead of slowly building his confidence with a capable semi-starter to back him up, he was given the #1 spot and struggled quite a bit, got injured.. partied a bit much.. had attitude issues... he wasn't ready. He was clearly rushed IMO.

Look at Rask in Boston for how things should be done.

So should Crosby have paid his dues in the minors before being handed everything on a silver platter in Pittsburgh? If the player is good enough then it doesn't matter if he's paid his dues, he's earned it by being that good. If we had kept Huet, he would join the list of wasted assets that Gainey lost for nothing like Souray, Streit, etc...

 

[yoyo999]

He was given the starter spot with Hamilton in the playoffs despite the fact Halak got goalie of the year in the AHL that year. You can't just push players who are performing aside like this. It's not right.

I think they told Halak he could play for Slovakia in the world championships that year. He'd conquered the AHL and was ready to show his stuff vs. better competition. As someone who went to a few of those AHL playoff games The Hamilton Bulldogs pulled that Calder Cup out of their A.....

The Carey Price Calder cup run showed some absolutely unreal goaltending. The Bulldogs weren't supposed to go to the Calder Cup and for all intents and purposes didn't have a great team. Some of the 'stars' included Maxim Lapierre, Kyle Chipchura, Matt D'agostini, Duncan Milroy, Corey Locke and Mikhail Grabovski. Ryan O'byrne and Andre Benoit were the top 2 D. The only player that became a serviceable NHL scorer was Grabovski.

Contrast the Hershey Bears, who they played in the final, were coached by Bruce Boudreau and had young players like Mike Green, Dave Steckel, Eric Fehr, Thomas Fleischmann and AHL lifer Alexandre Giroux who is an 80pt guy. They also beat the Chicago Wolves that year who were a stronger AHL team.

The AHL is meant for this type of thing, to get guys playing. I don't think a lot of NHL teams have a vested interest in their AHL teams winning the Calder Cup. Or else they would have probably told Halak to stay.

 

[Cole Caulifield]

So should Crosby have paid his dues in the minors before being handed everything on a silver platter in Pittsburgh? If the player is good enough then it doesn't matter if he's paid his dues, he's earned it by being that good. If we had kept Huet, he would join the list of wasted assets that Gainey lost for nothing like Souray, Streit, etc...

Goalies are almost never good enough to become starter at 20-21, and Price was not an exception either.

 

[Fish on The Sand]

They gave him everything on a silver platter. He never had to earn anything.

He was given the starter spot with Hamilton in the playoffs despite the fact Halak got goalie of the year in the AHL that year. You can't just push players who are performing aside like this. It's not right. It gives a player the wrong idea that they're entitled to things. But then he went ahead and had a great playoffs so they couldn't keep him there and have him play a full season in the AHL like they should have.

Then, he had a good rookie year sharing duties with Huet so ... they traded the #1 goalie at the deadline and made him start in the playoffs without a safety net... again the spot was handed to him on a silver platter. Predictably, crap hit the fan and it became obvious Price had been thrown in the fire against Philly. Instead of slowly building his confidence with a capable semi-starter to back him up, he was given the #1 spot and struggled quite a bit, got injured.. partied a bit much.. had attitude issues... he wasn't ready. He was clearly rushed IMO.

Look at Rask in Boston for how things should be done.

He got the starting job with Hamilton in the playoffs because Halak had been promoted to the NHL.

 

[Whitesnake]

The GM has last word. Gainey may not have hired Timmins but chances are he hired a number of scouts that surround Timmins. Gainey hired whatever player development staff there was with Mtl/Hamilton, I'm sure he also extended Timmins at least once probably more. He didn't start from scratch but he still build the scouting department and so deserves some credit for that.

The GM does not have the last work on players we drafted as chances he hasn't seen any of them. He might have hired scouts, but chances are that Timmins helped greatly to hire them in the process as Gainey has no experience in that domain.

Giving the GM any kind of praise for anything related to the draft is giving Houle some praise for the 1998 draft. The day that makes no sense, eveyrthing else doesn't either.

Your right we will never know for sure. But to then say let's judge a GM based on trades/signings is dumb. Things like trades are such a small part of what it takes to be successful that limiting ourselves to that aspect is a terrible way of making judgment.

Overall Gainey took a team that was consistently out of the playoffs and turned it into one that was consistently in the playoffs. He took a team that most top players didn't want to play for and left it one where top UFAs do want to play for. If you look at the team before/after Gainey's tenure it's night and day, could things have been better sure they always can.

Granted Savard started the turn around, and given time he MAY have been able to accomplish the same turnaround but it's far from a guarantee.

Judging Gainey based on what we had before is also pretty dumb as you are actually comparing Gainey to a management that will be known as one of the worst in the history of sports. Pretty easy to go up from that moment. Also, to Houle's defense or kind of, the Montreal Canadiens were not as healthy as they were after him. And it wasn't becuase of Gainey's immediate saavy moves. Round 2 in 2003, lockout right after, round 1 in 2005, out of playoffs in 2006...Had a great season in 2007, some worst years right after....yet, during Gainey's tenure, we had 1 round 3. Was better than with Houle, strange though while 1998 was an incredible draft that we still, to this day benefit from, thanks to Markov, all these other years, we had pathetic first rounders and other rounds that couldn't help this team to do much more than what they did. And there were TONS of possibilities out there that is the reason why Houle and even Savard didn't look as good as they should. Then came Timmins, hired by Savard, and things started to look up....

But to disregard trades and signings to evaluate a GM's work....well that's dumb to me. Can't really believe you're saying this as everybody look at a GM and evaluates him MOSTLY based on that. But somehow you don't....fine. Not sure there's a whole lot more to say after that....But when Gainey's best trait is that he was able to give us a better team than what it was before....fine. So it means he's better than Réjean Houle. Not sure he'd like to be remembered that way too....

 

[Whitesnake]

So should Crosby have paid his dues in the minors before being handed everything on a silver platter in Pittsburgh? If the player is good enough then it doesn't matter if he's paid his dues, he's earned it by being that good. If we had kept Huet, he would join the list of wasted assets that Gainey lost for nothing like Souray, Streit, etc...

So....because we keep Price in the AHL for 1 more year....he'd be a wasting asset? Why? How do you go from taking his time more to losing him for nothing? How the heck did Rask won that Vezina? Shouldn't he be a UFA ready to be given for nothing? And you do know that goalies are so different than the rest of the players. Even d-men needs to be looked at differently than forwards...can't imagine goaltending...

 

[OnTheRun]

Gainey wasn't fired simply because he had accumulated a ton of goodwill and respect in previous capacities as captain of the habs and GM of a cup winning Dallas team. Boivin simply didn't have the knowledge and experience to understand that Gainey had become incompetent in this new NHL in a GM capacity. Boivin just wasn't a hockey guy.

When Gainey stepped down, he appointed Gauthier as his successor. It's not "someone" who was happy with Gauthier's job. It's not like Gauthier got promoted to GM because he had done such a wonderful job. He got promoted because Gainey decided so and because Gainey was incompetent. Also, Gauthier was not fired solely because he hired Cunneyworth. He got fired because he was terrible for the job in most respects. The hiring of Cunneyworth was simply the final straw which showed everyone how in over his head he was.

Well that's not how it works...

Me, as a fan, can blame whoever I want. I can also draw conclusion based on results alone. Why can I do that? Because I am an uninvolved 3rd party.

If I say: "Gainey was terrible at assets management". I'm not wrong, technically anyway, because the results are there.

If I am Gainey's boss and I tell him to make the playoffs at all cost, I can't turn around and blame him for not unloading his UFAs at the trade deadline. I lost that right because I was involved in the decision process.

So yeah "someone" was "happy" with Gainey/Gauthier jobs. Mostly because Boivin's bubble and Gainey/Gauthier's bubbles overlapped and they were rolling in the same direction.

I saw G. Molson throw Cunneyworth under the bus on live television, and by doing so he threw Gauthier into the fire. So ultimately that why Gauthier lost his job. When upper management and middle management don't agree, this is when peoples start losing their jobs.

 

[DAChampion]

Price, Subban, Pacioretty might not be the majority but they are without question our top-3 players. You could have 50 Souray, Streits, and Hainsey's it's not equal to a single Subban. It doesn't matter all that much how many average assets you lose for nothing because they are easy to replace. What's hard to get is elite players. And Gainey acquired three of the four we have (I count Galchenyuk).

Hell if you make a list of the 7/8 most important players on the team the vast majority are either acquired under Gainey or were pre-Gainey players (i.e assets Gainey had to manage). It's rare for depth players to stay with the same team for more than a few years so looking at them is irrelevant.

1) Gainey had nothing to do with Subban really.
2) Plekanec and Markov were here before Gainey, both are comparably or more productive than Pacioretty.
3) McDonagh is as good as those three players.
4) Galchenyuk will be as good as those three by the end of this year.

Crediting that fool Gainey for this team is ridiculous.

 

[Whitesnake]

I saw G. Molson throw Cunneyworth under the bus on live television, and by doing so he threw Gauthier into the fire. So ultimately that why Gauthier lost his job. When upper management and middle management don't agree, this is when peoples start losing their jobs.

Gauthier fired himself the day he didn't remember what kind of market he was dealing with....

 

[Bullsmith]

I think it's an incredible testament to Price's character that he has overcome being rushed the way he was. Losing the starting job to Halak and then battling back to become a truly elite goalie is a pretty rare story. For me his international record is why I can use the phrasing "truly elite".

 

[Whitesnake]

Price, Subban, Pacioretty might not be the majority but they are without question our top-3 players. You could have 50 Souray, Streits, and Hainsey's it's not equal to a single Subban. It doesn't matter all that much how many average assets you lose for nothing because they are easy to replace. What's hard to get is elite players. And Gainey acquired three of the four we have (I count Galchenyuk).

Hell if you make a list of the 7/8 most important players on the team the vast majority are either acquired under Gainey or were pre-Gainey players (i.e assets Gainey had to manage). It's rare for depth players to stay with the same team for more than a few years so looking at them is irrelevant.

Come on man. Crediting Gainey for Subban means we also have to credit Houle for Markov. Please tell me that's not what you are doing. Réjean Houle has to be credited for one of the best draft in the history of drafts? With Beauchemin, Ribeiro and Ryder? 4 players who still to this day play in the NHL and have been more than fillers? You know why he can't? 'Cause at one point, when Houle lost his job, he was not rehired by anybody. While Pierre Dorion, the head scout, is still working to this day.

 

[NORiculous]

André Savard was a breath of fresh air after the Houle era. He was tasked with an incredible franchise salvage operation. I agree that the club started to reverse course when ASavard came on the scene.

I agree also but I think he is trying to take too much credit in that article. I always thought mouving him a side was a weird move but after reading that I would have mouve him asside too. I think hus attitude sucks and for all this time I had no idea but now I can see clearly. I'm now100% sure it qas a good move to find someone else.

Hidsight is 20/20 and everyone come back with the McDonagh deal but to Bob defense... When almost everyone wanted to trafe Price, he stoid up for him and said that price is a stud, and you die with players like him.




Anyway, it was an interresting read and Savard has gone down in my evaluation.

 

[Sorinth]

Goalies are almost never good enough to become starter at 20-21, and Price was not an exception either.

Yet he became a starter at 21 and up until his first injury the following year was playing great when he came back the whole team fell apart. He had one off year and Halak stepped up and then was back on top.

 

[Sorinth]

The GM does not have the last work on players we drafted as chances he hasn't seen any of them. He might have hired scouts, but chances are that Timmins helped greatly to hire them in the process as Gainey has no experience in that domain.

Giving the GM any kind of praise for anything related to the draft is giving Houle some praise for the 1998 draft. The day that makes no sense, eveyrthing else doesn't either.

Just because he doesn't use his veto doesn't mean he doesn't have it. Yes Gainey would let Timmins run the show but it's still a team that Gainey helped put together and then managed. And there's a whole lot more to developing an NHL player then simply making the right picks at the draft table.

Judging Gainey based on what we had before is also pretty dumb as you are actually comparing Gainey to a management that will be known as one of the worst in the history of sports. Pretty easy to go up from that moment. Also, to Houle's defense or kind of, the Montreal Canadiens were not as healthy as they were after him. And it wasn't becuase of Gainey's immediate saavy moves. Round 2 in 2003, lockout right after, round 1 in 2005, out of playoffs in 2006...Had a great season in 2007, some worst years right after....yet, during Gainey's tenure, we had 1 round 3. Was better than with Houle, strange though while 1998 was an incredible draft that we still, to this day benefit from, thanks to Markov, all these other years, we had pathetic first rounders and other rounds that couldn't help this team to do much more than what they did. And there were TONS of possibilities out there that is the reason why Houle and even Savard didn't look as good as they should. Then came Timmins, hired by Savard, and things started to look up....

But to disregard trades and signings to evaluate a GM's work....well that's dumb to me. Can't really believe you're saying this as everybody look at a GM and evaluates him MOSTLY based on that. But somehow you don't....fine. Not sure there's a whole lot more to say after that....But when Gainey's best trait is that he was able to give us a better team than what it was before....fine. So it means he's better than Réjean Houle. Not sure he'd like to be remembered that way too....

I'm not disregarding trades/signings, I'm saying they aren't the most/only thing we should look at when evaluating a GM. Arguably the most important task is hiring the right people.

You look at before/after because it takes time turn things around. Bergevin started as GM with 3 elite/star players (4 if you count Markov) and a 3rd overall pick. It's not the same situation at all so if we judge purely on how good the team is then it's completely unfair.

As for Houle, sure there's credit for Markov, but looking at one player/draft is all luck, you need a larger sample size to draw meaningful conclusions about how good/bad the scouting was. For Houle we have years a futility that tells us his amateur scouting/player development was crap. Does he not deserve some blame for that?

It's funny that things started to look up when Savard focused on the draft, yet most of the "studs" that Savard got failed to live up to expectations or make an impact. Higgins, Komisarek, Hainsey, Perezhogin, Hossa these were supposed to be core players yet never amounted to more then complimentary players. So sure things looked up but looking up and actually being up are two different things.

 

[Sorinth]

So....because we keep Price in the AHL for 1 more year....he'd be a wasting asset? Why? How do you go from taking his time more to losing him for nothing? How the heck did Rask won that Vezina? Shouldn't he be a UFA ready to be given for nothing? And you do know that goalies are so different than the rest of the players. Even d-men needs to be looked at differently than forwards...can't imagine goaltending...

Wasted asset was in reference to Huet being UFA. Had we kept him and then lost him to UFA then yes people would claim he was another wasted asset.

 

[Kimota]

Interesting discussion. Personally I always viewed Savard as someone who did a Hell of a job as GM. He wasn't a great one by any means but he was a solid hockey mind. If the Nords ever come back, they could do worse than hiring him as their first GM. He could be the experienced hand needed to start a franchise.

 

[Sorinth]

1) Gainey had nothing to do with Subban really.
2) Plekanec and Markov were here before Gainey, both are comparably or more productive than Pacioretty.
3) McDonagh is as good as those three players.
4) Galchenyuk will be as good as those three by the end of this year.

Crediting that fool Gainey for this team is ridiculous.

1) He acquired him, he surrounded him with players/coaches that would help develop him. Subban deserves the most credit for Subban but Gainey played his part.

2) You talked about assets being mismanaged. Well both Plekanec and Markov were assets that Gainey had to manage.

3 & 4) Agreed on both but you missed the point. Gainey acquired 3 elite players during his tenure with only one top-5 pick, that's quite an accomplishment. Llosing McDonagh simply means things could have been even better. Bergevin acquiring Galchenyuk is great but what does he have to do with anything. He's one of two maybe three core players brought in during the post Gainey era which is why I said majority not all.

 

[Kimota]

I agree also but I think he is trying to take too much credit in that article. I always thought mouving him a side was a weird move but after reading that I would have mouve him asside too. I think hus attitude sucks and for all this time I had no idea but now I can see clearly. I'm now100% sure it qas a good move to find someone else.

Hidsight is 20/20 and everyone come back with the McDonagh deal but to Bob defense... When almost everyone wanted to trafe Price, he stoid up for him and said that price is a stud, and you die with players like him.




Anyway, it was an interresting read and Savard has gone down in my evaluation.

The thing with Andre is that he always had a ship on his shoudler. I remember when he coached the Nords, they fired him and he went on a tirade saying "I'll never walk in this place again!". A few months later they hired him back as assistant GM and everything was forgiven and forgotten. He's got a sort of little guy complex and always feels mistreated. That is why I think he is saying these things, he's afraid he'll be forgotten. But once you get past that, he's a good guy.

 

[DAChampion]

1) He acquired him, he surrounded him with players/coaches that would help develop him. Subban deserves the most credit for Subban but Gainey played his part.

2) You talked about assets being mismanaged. Well both Plekanec and Markov were assets that Gainey had to manage.

3 & 4) Agreed on both but you missed the point. Gainey acquired 3 elite players during his tenure with only one top-5 pick, that's quite an accomplishment. Llosing McDonagh simply means things could have been even better. Bergevin acquiring Galchenyuk is great but what does he have to do with anything. He's one of two maybe three core players brought in during the post Gainey era which is why I said majority not all.

You're assigning credit to Gainey for him not being a failure across the board.

"We may have lost Hainsey, Beauchemin, Streit, Sourray, Komisarek, Mcdonagh for nothing ... but we didn't lose Plekanec, Markov, Pacioretty and Subban."

 

[Whitesnake]

Just because he doesn't use his veto doesn't mean he doesn't have it. Yes Gainey would let Timmins run the show but it's still a team that Gainey helped put together and then managed. And there's a whole lot more to developing an NHL player then simply making the right picks at the draft table.

Pretty good start. AS far as development, well then I'd say that his Junior coach when he goes back to his team....the AHL coach if he goes there, and the NHL coaching staff has a whole lot more to say in his development than the GM. 'Cause I also believe that bringing him early or late is something intangible you can't talk about. Some say Price has become great because he was brought in early. And I could say he would have become better earlier if he would have brought in a little later.

As for Houle, sure there's credit for Markov, but looking at one player/draft is all luck, you need a larger sample size to draw meaningful conclusions about how good/bad the scouting was. For Houle we have years a futility that tells us his amateur scouting/player development was crap. Does he not deserve some blame for that?

It's funny that things started to look up when Savard focused on the draft, yet most of the "studs" that Savard got failed to live up to expectations or make an impact. Higgins, Komisarek, Hainsey, Perezhogin, Hossa these were supposed to be core players yet never amounted to more then complimentary players. So sure things looked up but looking up and actually being up are two different things.

Houle deserves all the blame. Actually Corey deserves even more of the blame since he appointed Houle,a guy who couldn't say no but should have. But you don't need to convince me how that management was bad....it was awful. My point was mostly that people who used the fact that we looked better than the Houle era isn't exactly saying that we looked great.

And again, Savard didn't come up with the names you mentioned. His head scout did. Savard was GM for 2 1/2 years (though to know who was responsible for the 2003.....) and had Madden for 2000 and 2001. You're talking about samples...well chances are you have 2 years to analyse Savard's work compared to 7-8 years of Gainey. And once Savard gave the job to Timmins, it suddenly started to look better, though, again, not without mistakes.

 

[Whitesnake]

Wasted asset was in reference to Huet being UFA. Had we kept him and then lost him to UFA then yes people would claim he was another wasted asset.

Okay missed that one. Thanks. Yet, why were we suppose to lose him to UFA? Of course, maybe not talking contracts during the season, which was Gainey's motto, was also a problem 'cause guys at the end of a season, might as well see what's out there....But anyway, wasn't there a chance we'd re-sign him?

Well of course, seeing how Gainey treated this whole file, he couldn't care less about Huet, it was Price's team at that point so yep...he wanted a pick. Fine since it was his decision, at least he got a pick out of him. Yet...it wasn't the right decision at all.

 

[Brainiac]

Gauthier fired himself the day he didn't remember what kind of market he was dealing with....

Still took some time before the actual firing, though...

 

[Cole Caulifield]

Yet he became a starter at 21 and up until his first injury the following year was playing great when he came back the whole team fell apart. He had one off year and Halak stepped up and then was back on top.

He became a starter at 20 that year we traded Huet, and crashed and burned in the playoffs against Philly. Could not stop a beach ball. Then actually cried about it in the locker room and had a mini meltdown. Many were extremely worried that he had been thrown in the fire.

Then he followed it up with much inconsistency. The next two years were off years actually. Partied quite a bit. Stared down his dmen after mistakes. Raised his arms in the air a la Patrick Roy.

You can look at this and say that this was the proper way to develop a goalie in Montreal of all places but I think the whole process was extremely painful for both us the fans and him as a player.

Look no further than Rask and the bruins for how it should be done. They're virtually the same player with the same pedigree, same age... One got rushed, and the other did not.

 

[Brainiac]

You're assigning credit to Gainey for him not being a failure across the board.

"We may have lost Hainsey, Beauchemin, Streit, Sourray, Komisarek, Mcdonagh for nothing ... but we didn't lose Plekanec, Markov, Pacioretty and Subban."

When you look at it objectively, Gainey's plan for a cup run in 2008-2009 was good. We won the East in 2008 and made some additions (Tanguay) and could count on younger players getting better (Kostytsin bros, Price etc.) while the vets (Koivu, Markov, Kovalev) weren't too old. I guess anybody here would have said, come October 2009: good plan.

It went down the drain for totally random reasons - i.e. untimely injuries (Price, Markov), off-ice issues getting too much attention and good players apparently not getting along very well when it mattered.

Actually, I'm pretty sure Gainey was pissed because he realized come trade deadline that the best course was to blow it up and trade all our vets for picks and prospects. But he knew he couldn't do that because centenary and all. Knee-jerk reaction following summer: he let all the guys go and tries something else.

 

[Price My Man Crush]

When you look at it objectively, Gainey's plan for a cup run in 2008-2009 was good. We won the East in 2008 and made some additions (Tanguay) and could count on younger players getting better (Kostytsin bros, Price etc.) while the vets (Koivu, Markov, Kovalev) weren't too old. I guess anybody here would have said, come October 2009: good plan.

It went down the drain for totally random reasons - i.e. untimely injuries (Price, Markov), off-ice issues getting too much attention and good players apparently not getting along very well when it mattered.

Actually, I'm pretty sure Gainey was pissed because he realized come trade deadline that the best course was to blow it up and trade all our vets for picks and prospects. But he knew he couldn't do that because centenary and all. Knee-jerk reaction following summer: he let all the guys go and tries something else.

I know people don't remember what I'm going to say, but losing Streit really hurt us before going into that centennial year. Then, we lost Lang during the Superbowl Weekend against Boston IIRC.

Everything started to go wrong after that freaking All-Star game...
Wasn't the team like in first place in the NHL in December?