Joe Sakic - Record as Colorado Avalanche GM - Part II (Updates in First Post)

[Pokecheque]

Vegas did well, for sure. But the bold, italic part is a bit of a bold statement .
I mean.. a team won a cup after moving to a place called Colorado.

 

[Sea Eagles]

You can’t cherry pick, Eagles. Or you can’t credibly do so.

As the person in charge, Sakic made a number of dreadful draft/personnel decisions that led the Avs to the worst season-long result in a quarter century in the NHL. And yes, if the people who reported to him underperformed, that’s still reflective of Sakic’s performance. He was in charge.

That’s really bad.

Then he made some really good decisions that showed very positive results last year, and have seemingly set the Avs up nicely for the near future.

That’s very good.

Ignoring one but not the other (or making excuses for one but not the other) - in either direction - isn’t credible, IMO.

But in this instance, I feel I CAN appropriately cherry pick, and here's why:

YEAR 1
1. Patrick Roy quitting was outside of Joe Sakic's control.
2. Patrick Roy had a huge say in roster talent, systems, culture.
3. Bednar had little time to create a new system, bring in support (players / coaches).
4. The injury toll (on top of points 1-3) was excessive.
5. Sakic started working with Bednar in building his roster (and it's changed substantially).

YEAR 2
1. Bednar had a year to build systems, culture, limited roster.
2. Bednar then acquired new assistants.
3. Sakic made some magnificent trades, acquisitions, and sent others to minors etc.

I really can't blame Sakic for what happened in Bednar's first year. Some of it was outside Sakic's control. Roy got the job being a strong character, and wanting a whole lot of control (which is why he left inevitably).

 

[Pokecheque]

I think even Sakic would admit to the outright failure that was Joe Colborne. I don't recall the last time a player was so thoroughly exiled by an organization. I mean, I'm not entirely sure he's still alive at this point.

Look, even if you think the circumstances that led to the 2016-17 disaster were outside Sakic's control (and some of them were) you also can't just blame Roy for everything that went wrong prior. The awful 2014 offseason was both Roy and Sakic working in concert, and was one very big reason things ran aground two years later. Sakic's fingerprints were on the Iginla signing, the extensions to all those depth players, and the trading for and signing of Brad Stuart. The only signing that I'm told had nothing to do with Super Joe was Beauchemin.

That said, Sakic may deserve criticism for his mistakes as a young GM, he also deserves credit for learning from them. Given how insanely stubborn so many GMs are (which is one big reason I think a lot of them are just plain bad) it's refreshing to see someone evolve as the game does.

 

[Sea Eagles]

I think even Sakic would admit to the outright failure that was Joe Colborne. I don't recall the last time a player was so thoroughly exiled by an organization. I mean, I'm not entirely sure he's still alive at this point.

Look, even if you think the circumstances that led to the 2016-17 disaster were outside Sakic's control (and some of them were) you also can't just blame Roy for everything that went wrong prior. The awful 2014 offseason was both Roy and Sakic working in concert, and was one very big reason things ran aground two years later. Sakic's fingerprints were on the Iginla signing, the extensions to all those depth players, and the trading for and signing of Brad Stuart. The only signing that I'm told had nothing to do with Super Joe was Beauchemin.

That said, Sakic may deserve criticism for his mistakes as a young GM, he also deserves credit for learning from them. Given how insanely stubborn so many GMs are (which is one big reason I think a lot of them are just plain bad) it's refreshing to see someone evolve as the game does.

Honestly mate, I blame a culmination of many, many things for that season. And I mean top to bottom. You can't pin-point one area to completely blame. That said, same goes with the improvement. Sakic was amazing, but so were the coaches, players, management - everyone involved.

Live and die as a club / community I guess.

 

[klozge]

I think even Sakic would admit to the outright failure that was Joe Colborne. I don't recall the last time a player was so thoroughly exiled by an organization. I mean, I'm not entirely sure he's still alive at this point.

Look, even if you think the circumstances that led to the 2016-17 disaster were outside Sakic's control (and some of them were) you also can't just blame Roy for everything that went wrong prior. The awful 2014 offseason was both Roy and Sakic working in concert, and was one very big reason things ran aground two years later. Sakic's fingerprints were on the Iginla signing, the extensions to all those depth players, and the trading for and signing of Brad Stuart. The only signing that I'm told had nothing to do with Super Joe was Beauchemin.

That said, Sakic may deserve criticism for his mistakes as a young GM, he also deserves credit for learning from them. Given how insanely stubborn so many GMs are (which is one big reason I think a lot of them are just plain bad) it's refreshing to see someone evolve as the game does.

I really don't think he still deserves to be criticized for his earlier mistakes. He hasn't only learned from them, he also corrected them and turned them into a solid foundation for the 2nd rebuild. He couldn't have done it much better if he had already thought "we need to rebuild again" in 2014, especially because he also needed to make drastic changes to the Avs' infrastructure. I don't think he was already playing the long game in 2014 but he managed to make it look that way in hindsight.

 

[Pokecheque]

Honestly mate, I blame a culmination of many, many things for that season. And I mean top to bottom. You can't pin-point one area to completely blame. That said, same goes with the improvement. Sakic was amazing, but so were the coaches, players, management - everyone involved.

Live and die as a club / community I guess.

You need to read my posts again. Where was I pin-pointing? You're the one who said you could "cherry pick" if one can be allowed to mix metaphors, not me. Sakic deserves high praise for getting this club back on track, but he does not entirely escape blame for it running aground on his watch as well. I find your eternal optimism refreshing at times, but you don't get to ignore the mistakes Sakic has made and then give him praise for learning from those mistakes.

 

[Pokecheque]

I should add that Sakic himself has reportedly owned some of his past mistakes, particularly signing 35+ veterans to multi-year deals, which I'm fairly confident he will never do again after getting burned badly two years in a row.

 

[ABasin]

But in this instance, I feel I CAN appropriately cherry pick, and here's why:

YEAR 1
1. Patrick Roy quitting was outside of Joe Sakic's control.
2. Patrick Roy had a huge say in roster talent, systems, culture.
3. Bednar had little time to create a new system, bring in support (players / coaches).
4. The injury toll (on top of points 1-3) was excessive.
5. Sakic started working with Bednar in building his roster (and it's changed substantially).

YEAR 2
1. Bednar had a year to build systems, culture, limited roster.
2. Bednar then acquired new assistants.
3. Sakic made some magnificent trades, acquisitions, and sent others to minors etc.

I really can't blame Sakic for what happened in Bednar's first year. Some of it was outside Sakic's control. Roy got the job being a strong character, and wanting a whole lot of control (which is why he left inevitably).

Sakic has been in charge for only two years? Many of the decisions that led to that dreadful roster were made prior to those last two years. Sakic was in charge, it was his responsibility.

 

[Foppa2118]

I think the problems of the past are multifold. I think they expected to fill a lot of the holes on the team, especially the blueline, through UFA. Except they missed on a few guys and that put more emphasis on them needing to make a trade, or draft their way out of it. They didn't draft particularly well, so that put more emphasis on their ability to make a big trade or two to fix the team.

They finally were able to dig their way out of things with two big trades of O'Reilly and Duchene. This finally started to improve the quality in depth on the blueline, but it cost them two key players, and they got younger as a team as a result. Leaving them a poor inexperienced team for a little while longer.

This is what led to Roy leaving. They had terrible lineups for those years, kept missing out on UFA's, held off on trading key players like ROR and Duchene, and that meant veteran stop gaps were their only option. Meanwhile Roy was out there taking arrows for his team while media and fans were putting all the blame on him.

The approach just took way longer than they expected because they had to trade their way out of it, and that made them younger. I think they thought they could be where they're hoping to be next season, in Roy's third season, but it took a little longer. I think Sakic being a little gunshy on trading Duchene early on played a role in that, but he was able to bring in a good return eventually.

Classic tale of the best laid plans going awry.

 

[Ivan13]

You make Roy seems like a martyr when he was the kid who pouted when things didn't go his way and took his ball and went home. Took arrows and criticism? All well deserved, and plenty of people were calling out Joe as well. One stuck around and tried to clean the mess he helped create, the other acted like a petulant child and bailed at the most unfortunate time.

 

[RockLobster]

But in this instance, I feel I CAN appropriately cherry pick, and here's why:

YEAR 1
1. Patrick Roy quitting was outside of Joe Sakic's control.
2. Patrick Roy had a huge say in roster talent, systems, culture.
3. Bednar had little time to create a new system, bring in support (players / coaches).
4. The injury toll (on top of points 1-3) was excessive.
5. Sakic started working with Bednar in building his roster (and it's changed substantially).

YEAR 2
1. Bednar had a year to build systems, culture, limited roster.
2. Bednar then acquired new assistants.
3. Sakic made some magnificent trades, acquisitions, and sent others to minors etc.

I really can't blame Sakic for what happened in Bednar's first year. Some of it was outside Sakic's control. Roy got the job being a strong character, and wanting a whole lot of control (which is why he left inevitably).

Joe Sakic has had final say on all roster decisions since he & Roy took charge before the 2013-14 season. While Roy certainly had a voice, he didn't have final say or control--Joe made that perfectly clear in the introductory news conference ("I and I alone have final say...")

We see where the schism happened, largely the year Jost was drafted. From my understanding while Roy had no issue w/ Tyson Jost as a player/prospect, he certainly wasn't the player he wanted (I believe that was Chychrun when he fell). And honestly, it's hard to say that he was wrong in that desire. That was viewed by Roy as just a confirmation of a growing suspicion that he wouldn't be listened to for what he felt he needed to compete (for instance--Brad Stuart, despite popular opinion, wasn't someone Roy really wanted, but he was given him anyway). Now that's not to say that Roy was without his faults, he certainly has them, but he continues to collect way too much blame on this board while Joe seemingly gets off scot-free (from a certain section of posters), when Joe had made it emphatically clear that he would be the one with the final say over everything.

So people can counter with "Yeah, but Roy still suggested 'so-and-so'...", which could be true, but Joe still said "Yeah, okay that sounds good!" and signed so-and-so.

Or basically, what AB posted

Sakic has been in charge for only two years? Many of the decisions that led to that dreadful roster were made prior to those last two years. Sakic was in charge, it was his responsibility.

 

[Pokecheque]

I think the problems of the past are multifold. I think they expected to fill a lot of the holes on the team, especially the blueline, through UFA. Except they missed on a few guys and that put more emphasis on them needing to make a trade, or draft their way out of it. They didn't draft particularly well, so that put more emphasis on their ability to make a big trade or two to fix the team.

They finally were able to dig their way out of things with two big trades of O'Reilly and Duchene. This finally started to improve the quality in depth on the blueline, but it cost them two key players, and they got younger as a team as a result. Leaving them a poor inexperienced team for a little while longer.

This is what led to Roy leaving. They had terrible lineups for those years, kept missing out on UFA's, held off on trading key players like ROR and Duchene, and that meant veteran stop gaps were their only option. Meanwhile Roy was out there taking arrows for his team while media and fans were putting all the blame on him.

The approach just took way longer than they expected because they had to trade their way out of it, and that made them younger. I think they thought they could be where they're hoping to be next season, in Roy's third season, but it took a little longer. I think Sakic being a little gunshy on trading Duchene early on played a role in that, but he was able to bring in a good return eventually.

Classic tale of the best laid plans going awry.

You make Roy seems like a martyr when he was the kid who pouted when things didn't go his way and took his ball and went home. Took arrows and criticism? All well deserved, and plenty of people were calling out Joe as well. One stuck around and tried to clean the mess he helped create, the other acted like a petulant child and bailed at the most unfortunate time.

Agreed 100% with Ivan. This is a straw man narrative, and it's not the first time it's been brought up. No one is blaming him for everything that went wrong, in fact, the current argument is that Sakic deserves a sizable portion of that blame even while he deserves credit for getting things back on track.

The blame Roy took was deserved. There was nothing disproportionate about it.

 

[Foppa2118]

You make Roy seems like a martyr when he was the kid who pouted when things didn't go his way and took his ball and went home. Took arrows and criticism? All well deserved, and plenty of people were calling out Joe as well. One stuck around and tried to clean the mess he helped create, the other acted like a petulant child and bailed at the most unfortunate time.

He's not a martyr but he was far from the problem with the team, and he was made into an easy scapegoat. The team just wasn't good, plain and simple. He tried different ways to work around it's shortcomings as a coach, and it worked for one year, but no one was turning that team into a consistent playoff team. Just go back and look at the players on those teams, compared to what they have now.

I don't like that he left later in the summer, but I completely understand why he left. From day one he made an effort to shield the players on his poorly constructed team from blame, and due to the reasons I mentioned, the team wasn't going to get better for a while longer. Meaning that he was gonna continue to be blamed for all the problems, inevitably preventing Sakic from bringing him back. So why go through that, and continue to tarnish a HOF reputation. Just step away on your own terms.

He should have made up his mind sooner though, I agree.

Agreed 100% with Ivan. This is a straw man narrative, and it's not the first time it's been brought up. No one is blaming him for everything that went wrong, in fact, the current argument is that Sakic deserves a sizable portion of that blame even while he deserves credit for getting things back on track.

The blame Roy took was deserved. There was nothing disproportionate about it.

It's not at all a straw man unless you take the phrase blaming him for everything, as blaming him for 100%. He quite clearly gets 80-90% of the blame. At least in terms of public comments.

If there was a UFA signing or trade that didn't work out, Roy is primarily the one blamed, despite the fact no one knows who led the charge to acquire who.

If the team didn't play well, people made up reasons for why Roy's strategy was to blame. Stretching out the D and forwards on the breakout was an example of this. People talked endlessly about this being an example of Roy's bad system, despite the fact he did it to try and pull some of the forecheckers away from his low skilled and slow blueline, to keep them from turning the puck over in the zone so often. The same strategy that many other teams utilize, like the Pens who used it in their recent Cup run, and Bednar who has used it on occasion as well.

The team was not good, and he couldn't find a way to work around it, or keep it competitive enough until Sakic was able to construct it properly. They thought Sacco would be the rebuild coach, and then Roy would take over when it was closer to competing. That's not how it played out. They ended up stretching out the rebuild for his entire tenure up until now.

Rebuild coaches don't tend to stick around past their initial contracts. Roy got a four year deal, as opposed to the usual three year. Bednar kind of qualifies as a rebuild coach, and if he can duplicate last years success, he'll prove to be one of the exceptions to that.

 

[Pokecheque]

No, I don't think he gets even 80-90%. Rick Pracey is definitely Persona Non Grata when it comes to the Avs, he gets a ton of shit, deserved or not (I think it's deserved). Billington is not exactly popular either.

Again, I don't think Roy gets an inordinate amount of blame but I can see some revisionist historians coming back and pointing the finger at him if indeed Sakic gets this team to the Promised Land the next 2-4 years. I just don't think it's there yet.

Roy was far from the biggest problem, but he absolutely was a problem. I don't think he was a good NHL coach, nor do I think he had a keen managerial mind for the pros. I'll say it again though, I hope he gets one more shot someday, totally unencumbered, to prove me wrong. Very, very doubtful he does though.

 

[expatriatedtexan]

I wish NHLtv would hire JR and Roy to do a one hour nightly show to follow "On the Fly" every night. They could call it "Off the Cuff". It would be can't miss television for me.

 

[Pokecheque]

Oh and I don't know if I said otherwise, but while I didn't love the timing of Roy's resignation, I don't hold a ton of ill will toward him for doing it. I don't think he ever would've gotten fired, at least not until there was a very long, protracted, and ugly standoff between him and Sakic. And I think had he "stood his ground," there's a very good chance Sakic would've left first. So while it sucked that Roy left the way he did, he didn't turn this into a circus, and as Vancouver is proving, it very easily can become that.

 

[Foppa2118]

No, I don't think he gets even 80-90%. Rick Pracey is definitely Persona Non Grata when it comes to the Avs, he gets a ton of ****, deserved or not (I think it's deserved). Billington is not exactly popular either.

Again, I don't think Roy gets an inordinate amount of blame but I can see some revisionist historians coming back and pointing the finger at him if indeed Sakic gets this team to the Promised Land the next 2-4 years. I just don't think it's there yet.

Roy was far from the biggest problem, but he absolutely was a problem. I don't think he was a good NHL coach, nor do I think he had a keen managerial mind for the pros. I'll say it again though, I hope he gets one more shot someday, totally unencumbered, to prove me wrong. Very, very doubtful he does though.

We can agree to disagree on what Roy deserved blame for but Billington and Pracey don't get anywhere near the amount of criticism Roy got. It's not even in the same stratosphere.

 

[Pokecheque]

We can agree to disagree on what Roy deserved blame for but Billington and Pracey don't get anywhere near the amount of criticism Roy got. It's not even in the same stratosphere.

Eh, we shall indeed agree to disagree. Any Avs fan with a brain and a pulse agrees that the drafting under Pracey outside of 2009 was disastrous. I still don't see any evidence of Roy getting an inordinate amount of blame, apart from the occasional whack-job fan who thinks the Avs failed by not signing Tavares and/or trading for Skinner.

 

[Ivan13]

Craig Billington is the worst hockey ops guy in the league. Rick Pracey is a guy whose mantra was charachter, skill and compete and he drafted Bleackley and Heard. Nuff said.

 

[Foppa2118]

Eh, we shall indeed agree to disagree. Any Avs fan with a brain and a pulse agrees that the drafting under Pracey outside of 2009 was disastrous. I still don't see any evidence of Roy getting an inordinate amount of blame, apart from the occasional whack-job fan who thinks the Avs failed by not signing Tavares and/or trading for Skinner.

There were like 15-20 negative comments a day about Roy here, and that might be a little conservative. Maybe you managed to miss it somehow, but it dominated the conversations around here for a long time. It would take a month or more to see the same number of critiques for Pracey or Billington.

 

[Pokecheque]

Oh no doubt I was one of those negative commenters. The turning point for me was October 8, 2015--the season opener meltdown against the Wylde. Obviously I didn't turn on him based on ONE GAME, but that was when I finally had had enough. And admittedly even then I overreacted...just a tad.

I guess it comes down to perception. I'm going by what I feel is fan sentiment, and I feel that a lot of fans still blame Pracey for the shit drafting/development that took place under his watch, and it's crazy because perception of his performance was largely positive leading up to that point, I even remember decrying the move until further analysis provided to me convinced me otherwise.

I'm not gonna go by "number of negative posts." We as a group tend to overreact on a game-to-game basis in both positive and negative ways. People were putting MacKinnon on blast early on in 2017-18, then he flipped the proverbial switch. Of course people were slagging Roy, perhaps a bit excessively, but by Year Three his inability to show any growth as a coach (if anything, he regressed over that time) and his antiquated ideas on what made a winner is what ultimately turned the fans on him.

And I really don't recall Roy being thrown under the bus during the 2016-17 disaster, but boy Sakic and Bednar sure did bear the brunt of the fans' ire. You can't tell me it was 15-20 negative posts decrying Roy during that time.

 

[Foppa2118]

Oh no doubt I was one of those negative commenters. The turning point for me was October 8, 2015--the season opener meltdown against the Wylde. Obviously I didn't turn on him based on ONE GAME, but that was when I finally had had enough. And admittedly even then I overreacted...just a tad.

I guess it comes down to perception. I'm going by what I feel is fan sentiment, and I feel that a lot of fans still blame Pracey for the **** drafting/development that took place under his watch, and it's crazy because perception of his performance was largely positive leading up to that point, I even remember decrying the move until further analysis provided to me convinced me otherwise.

I'm not gonna go by "number of negative posts." We as a group tend to overreact on a game-to-game basis in both positive and negative ways. People were putting MacKinnon on blast early on in 2017-18, then he flipped the proverbial switch. Of course people were slagging Roy, perhaps a bit excessively, but by Year Three his inability to show any growth as a coach (if anything, he regressed over that time) and his antiquated ideas on what made a winner is what ultimately turned the fans on him.

And I really don't recall Roy being thrown under the bus during the 2016-17 disaster, but boy Sakic and Bednar sure did bear the brunt of the fans' ire. You can't tell me it was 15-20 negative posts decrying Roy during that time.

There were a ton of negative posts about Roy all the way up until somewhere during last season. That's when they finally started to die down. IMO because the team was finally doing well, and people didn't need to direct their anger somewhere.

Bednar got a ton of hate too. No doubt. If Roy got the amount of hate he got for coaching a bubble team though, imagine what it would have been like if he stayed and his team finished dead last as the worst team in decades?

Either the board would have shut down, or everyone would have been banned from the resulting tirades. Or both.

 

[Pokecheque]

Ya know, that would've been interesting to see what would they would've done had Roy stayed on and the team went down the tubes in similar fashion. But I'll agree, it would've been meltdown central from the fans.

 

[McMetal]

I was very much not a fan of Roy as a coach. He was a one-trick pony and it worked until Yeo wrote the book on him and the entire league read it. He was a great motivator but bad at strategy, and his assistants only magnified his flaws rather than covered them.

But the real problem with the Avs before Roy left was neither Sakic nor Roy. It was the two of them together. Roy had too much power/respect in the org, and he and Sakic were clearly not on the same page. Two competing visions for the team pulling in opposite directions led to a franchise without an identity, and that's what led to the meltdown. It was like two different teams had been thrown together the day before the game and had no idea what to do with each other. One fast and skilled, one slow and heavy. I strongly believe that one or the other alone could have done better than that because at least the team would have known what it wanted to be. Instead, we got the pile of spare parts with no cap space that dropped a giant deuce in 16-17.

 

[ABasin]

Joe Sakic has had final say on all roster decisions since he & Roy took charge before the 2013-14 season. While Roy certainly had a voice, he didn't have final say or control--Joe made that perfectly clear in the introductory news conference ("I and I alone have final say...")

We see where the schism happened, largely the year Jost was drafted. From my understanding while Roy had no issue w/ Tyson Jost as a player/prospect, he certainly wasn't the player he wanted (I believe that was Chychrun when he fell). And honestly, it's hard to say that he was wrong in that desire. That was viewed by Roy as just a confirmation of a growing suspicion that he wouldn't be listened to for what he felt he needed to compete (for instance--Brad Stuart, despite popular opinion, wasn't someone Roy really wanted, but he was given him anyway). Now that's not to say that Roy was without his faults, he certainly has them, but he continues to collect way too much blame on this board while Joe seemingly gets off scot-free (from a certain section of posters), when Joe had made it emphatically clear that he would be the one with the final say over everything.

So people can counter with "Yeah, but Roy still suggested 'so-and-so'...", which could be true, but Joe still said "Yeah, okay that sounds good!" and signed so-and-so.

Or basically, what AB posted

As much as I am enjoying the debate between two long standing respected members of the group, I still maintain that their content is mostly not relevant to whether or not Sakic is/was responsible.

Sakic was responsible for what happened with the team back then, because Sakic was in charge of the organization back then. Sakic is responsible for what happened to the team two years ago. He is also responsible for the steps forward they made last year.

Sakic had both signoff/veto power back then, he had both last year, he has both now. He is responsible for the team's fortunes, or lack thereof.