Ivan13
Not posting anymore
Looking at the Drury thread we have here I decided to put this thread up so that we can see what people, in general, think about Pierre Lacroix and what he did in Colorado. The text below is taken from the Drury thread and I will expand a bit on it as well:
PL came to power with the Quebec Nordiques in 1994 after spending years as an agent for NHL players, most notably Patrick Roy. His appointment came in a time when the young talent-laden team has finally started to show what it can do, while still battling inconsistencies that cost them a spot in the playoffs in 94. As said before the team was loaded with young talented players ready to take the next step and it also gave him a lot of ammunition for going forward.
His first big trade was the Sundin one. The first trade that showed how narrow-minded he is in his approach to players who ask more than he thinks they are worth. Most will rationalize the trade and say that the Avs, later on, used Wendel Clarke to get Lemieux and in turn played a great role in them winning the first Cup, but looking at this trade as an isolated "incident" it doesn't look too good. The Nordiques traded away a 23-year-old budding superstar in Mats Sundin along with depth defensemen for a 27-year-old Clarke as the main piece who came off a career year scoring 46 goals, but whose career would be downhill from there as he had a lot more mileage and wear and tear on his body than an average 27-year-old. the secondary piece that the Qs received was Lefebvre who did play a substantial role in their first run to the Cup.
His next big move was to move Owen Nolan for Ozo. This was a great move for the Avalanche as Ozo proved to be the missing part to the style of game the Avs wanted to play.
Next move to follow was getting Lemieux from the Islanders, here Lacroix recouped some of the value he lost in the Sundin deal by moving a Clarke who was a flop for a known winner and great playoff performer. I'm not sure how to look at Pepe's time with the Avs, he sure helped a lot and was a big part of the winning team, but he also woke the sleeping giant in Detroit with what he did to Draper. To this day I believe that that event helped fuel the Red Wings and provided Bowman with bulletin board material that he used to wake up a team that could've been pushed over at times.
I won't say much about the Roy trade as plenty of ink was spilled over that one.
Then came the Ricci trade, which turned out great in the end as it netted them Tanguay with the first rounder they received from San Jose. Shean Donovan, on the other hand, was a complete flop for them.
Throwing away Chris Simon and Leschysyn for Keith Jones.
The Ray Bourque trade was obviously a good one for the Avs.
Then add the trades mentioned in the quote above and it doesn't look too good.
But with all the trades and their questionable outcomes, his biggest failing was draft and development. In his years as a GM, the Avalanche has produced a grand total of one homegrown top 4 defenseman in JM Liles. The two other potential ones they have drafted have been either given up before they played a game for the Avs (Regher), or have been bungled so badly (they played Johnny Boychuck at wing for crying out loud)they would've for sure failed had they stayed. Between Foote and Liles there is a complete wasteland of wasted picks and ruined developments that ended only with Shattenkirk and Barrie, who were drafted 7 and 9 years after Liles respectively. The goalie record is even worse, they haven't drafted a single goalie who had more than one decent season as a starter. The closest they got was Aebischer who had one good season right before the lockout with 62 games played and high save percentage before he completely fell apart.
There's more I can add here, but I will leave that for a later date.
Lacroix didn't trade Drury because he wanted to shore up the D, he traded him because Drury dared to ask for more money than PL thought he deserved. A familiar pattern that showed its ugly head far too often, most notably with Ozo, Tangs and O'Reilly. Not to mention that his view on the bottom 6 players as cannon fodder costed the Avs dearly at times. He let go of Keane who later because a torn in their side with the Stars, dumped Yelle in the Drury deal etc. But his biggest failing was the coaches, while other powerhouses were coached by the likes of Burns, Big Bird, Hitchcock, Lemaire and Bowman we had the likes of Heartley, Craw and Granato. I feel grateful to him for the two Cup winners he helped build, but I feel they should've won more.
Also, he got raked over the coals so bad in each deal he made with Calgary it's mind-boggling, he basically gave away three-star players (Tangs, Drury and Regher) and a great 4th line center in an era when they were worth quite a bit for a bandaid in Leopold, Morris, McAmmond, Shantz, two 2nd rounders (used to draft C Cody Burki and G Trevor Cann who both flopped spectacularly), Chris Dingman and 33 games of Theo Fleury. Getting that return for any of the three guys the Avs traded is horrible, getting that junk for the three combined is just awful beyond belief and along with the horrible drafting and development system (in particular goalies and D) has set the Avs spiraling out of control and they still haven't recovered from it.
Anyway, since the PL discussion is OT I'll create a new thread where we can discuss his legacy and how he should be viewed around the league to avoid further derailing this thread. I'm also interested in hearing what outsiders think about his moves and legacy.
PL came to power with the Quebec Nordiques in 1994 after spending years as an agent for NHL players, most notably Patrick Roy. His appointment came in a time when the young talent-laden team has finally started to show what it can do, while still battling inconsistencies that cost them a spot in the playoffs in 94. As said before the team was loaded with young talented players ready to take the next step and it also gave him a lot of ammunition for going forward.
His first big trade was the Sundin one. The first trade that showed how narrow-minded he is in his approach to players who ask more than he thinks they are worth. Most will rationalize the trade and say that the Avs, later on, used Wendel Clarke to get Lemieux and in turn played a great role in them winning the first Cup, but looking at this trade as an isolated "incident" it doesn't look too good. The Nordiques traded away a 23-year-old budding superstar in Mats Sundin along with depth defensemen for a 27-year-old Clarke as the main piece who came off a career year scoring 46 goals, but whose career would be downhill from there as he had a lot more mileage and wear and tear on his body than an average 27-year-old. the secondary piece that the Qs received was Lefebvre who did play a substantial role in their first run to the Cup.
His next big move was to move Owen Nolan for Ozo. This was a great move for the Avalanche as Ozo proved to be the missing part to the style of game the Avs wanted to play.
Next move to follow was getting Lemieux from the Islanders, here Lacroix recouped some of the value he lost in the Sundin deal by moving a Clarke who was a flop for a known winner and great playoff performer. I'm not sure how to look at Pepe's time with the Avs, he sure helped a lot and was a big part of the winning team, but he also woke the sleeping giant in Detroit with what he did to Draper. To this day I believe that that event helped fuel the Red Wings and provided Bowman with bulletin board material that he used to wake up a team that could've been pushed over at times.
I won't say much about the Roy trade as plenty of ink was spilled over that one.
Then came the Ricci trade, which turned out great in the end as it netted them Tanguay with the first rounder they received from San Jose. Shean Donovan, on the other hand, was a complete flop for them.
Throwing away Chris Simon and Leschysyn for Keith Jones.
The Ray Bourque trade was obviously a good one for the Avs.
Then add the trades mentioned in the quote above and it doesn't look too good.
But with all the trades and their questionable outcomes, his biggest failing was draft and development. In his years as a GM, the Avalanche has produced a grand total of one homegrown top 4 defenseman in JM Liles. The two other potential ones they have drafted have been either given up before they played a game for the Avs (Regher), or have been bungled so badly (they played Johnny Boychuck at wing for crying out loud)they would've for sure failed had they stayed. Between Foote and Liles there is a complete wasteland of wasted picks and ruined developments that ended only with Shattenkirk and Barrie, who were drafted 7 and 9 years after Liles respectively. The goalie record is even worse, they haven't drafted a single goalie who had more than one decent season as a starter. The closest they got was Aebischer who had one good season right before the lockout with 62 games played and high save percentage before he completely fell apart.
There's more I can add here, but I will leave that for a later date.
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