Other coach options?

[rboomercat90]

The Lucic thing I will say this, this GM paid this guy $6 million for 7 years and he can't even play with McDavid for 2 PERIODS?

What's the ****ing point of his "physicality" if he can't even occasionally be bumped up to the 1st line to protect McDavid for half a game without crapping the bed?

Todd was right to put him there, the game was getting chippy and maybe the guy could give us 2 lousy periods of OK play, but he can't even manage that.

And really the game was lost on those missed breakaways. Which happens to under skilled teams.

Mclellan gets to stop coaching because his players missed some breakaways? Was the game over at that point? No, the team was winning the game. It was lost for any number of reasons that have been discussed non stop since last night. Most of which were the results of his poor decisions. You’ve just illustrated exactly what’s wrong with him. He has no clue how to deal with adversity in a game. He doesn’t seem to realize that he may need to do more in a game than he originally expected. Now he’s throwing players under the bus too, just like he did in San Jose.

 

[Cloned]

I have doubts either of Q or AV would come here though. I mean any coach that does his homework on this roster is likely gonna look at it and say "I'm being set up to be screwed". Maaaaybe AV, maybe he's been out for a bit and has that itch to coach and he would jump in but I dunno.

I think Q says no.

I think Bob Hartley would say yes. I'm not sure how much of an upgrade that is.

Hartley? May as well hire Keenan and Sutter as assistants and get all the former Flames here.

 

[Burnt Biscuits]

Alain Vigneault. I've been lobbying for him on social media for a few weeks now.

His Resume:
-Went to the Stanley Cup Final twice, each with Vancouver and New York
-Won the President's trophy twice with both Vancouver and New York
-Won the division 5 years straight with Vancouver and with New York in 2015
-Missed the playoffs once (last year) in the last 10 years
-Jack Adams winner in '07
-Of the 11 times he made the playoffs, he's made it past the 1st round 8 times
-His 1st year in Vancouver, they won the division and went 7 games in the 2nd round. His 1st year in New York, they went to the cup final

The key with him, is that he accomplished all those feats with two very different teams, in different conferences. Sometimes there are coaches, stanley cup winning coaches, that are outstanding with their respective team, but more often than not, are unable to replicate that success with a different team. Vigneault has proven he can carry that success from one team to the next.

I honestly want him to take the job more than Legendary Q. Joel has already stated that he doesn't want to go to a rebuilding team (as per Friedman), he wants to join an experienced and mature group, that has a history of success. I think he's referring to St.Louis, Pitts, Anaheim. Maybe even L.A.

Good post and good pitch. My general sense for AV is he is very good at identifying individual players strengths and weaknesses and knows how to deploy players to play to their strengths and avoid their weaknesses, very good at line matching. What I don't think AV is great at is pushing players to develop past the nitch that they reside in, while some players posting career bests under him I'd say it's cause of how he utilizes them and not as much that he is getting them to higher plateaus. AV's teams tend to play more skill based (though he does like having the odd tough guy) and seems to forgo the grittier side in favor of pursuing the scoreboard battle, while just winning the scoreboard battle is the right call just about every time, there are times in the playoffs where you got to play physical to grind a team and break them down, in more than a few cases it felt like AV's teams were on the wrong end of the grinding.

 

[Burnt Biscuits]

I think realistically if Bobby Burgers call around he'll get the following responses

Quennville - No
Vingenault - Probably no.
Hartley - Yes
D. Sutter - I'm retired, but I've always had a secret fantasy of coaching the Oilers, maybe.
B. Sutter - Yes
Gulutzan - Yes
Bylsma - (we don't want this guy)
Nelson - No

Of the people likely to say yes, I think Bob Hartley is probably the best option, but I dunno how much better than Todd he is. At least his post-game scrums would be fun to listen to.

I don't think Hartley is a good coach, to me what he is great at is wringing every bit of effort out of a team, Hartley teams rarely get outworked when he first comes onboard, but at some point they hit a wall and he just isn't able to keep getting the best out of them. He doesn't seem to be a good systems coach or development coach. just a master motivator, unlikely to leave the team better off. If you want to make the playoffs this year, not a bad guy to pick up, want to build a strong franchise with a solid foundation for success going forward, not an ideal candidate.

 

[Cloned]

I think realistically if Bobby Burgers call around he'll get the following responses

Quennville - No
Vingenault - Probably no.
Hartley - Yes
D. Sutter - I'm retired, but I've always had a secret fantasy of coaching the Oilers, maybe.
B. Sutter - Yes
Gulutzan - Yes
Bylsma - (we don't want this guy)
Nelson - No

Of the people likely to say yes, I think Bob Hartley is probably the best option, but I dunno how much better than Todd he is. At least his post-game scrums would be fun to listen to.

You forgot

 

[TheNumber4]

You forgot

That's great. Came in a loss to the Oilers too where Horcoff got a Hat Trick (!)

 

[Burnt Biscuits]

If you look at our roster and evaluate it honestly: (just focus on forwards for now)

• How many legit 1st line forwards do we have? I'd say 2 (McDavid & Drai)
• How many legit 2nd line forwards do we have? I'd say 1 (RNH)
• How many legit 3rd line forwards do we have? I'd say 1 (Rieder)

Everyone else is basically a 4th liner, with only Lucic and I'd say Spooner having a higher established level of play for a decent chunk of time. Lucic's hands are just gone right now, you might want to blame that on the coach cause of him losing his confidence, but I think it's just part of his game degrading and the league getting increasingly skewed towards speed that is pushing him towards being irrelevant. The reads Spooner is making on the ice are pretty darn questionable, we might be able to squeeze some 3rd line-ish point totals out of him, but it doesn't seem like he will be a net positive as a player, just too leaky defensively, just two games and I feel I got a sense why he was being used as a 4th liner in NYR. Then I'd say the present forward stand-out is Chiasson who was for all of about one season a 3rd liner who was seen as young and trending towards being a 2nd liner, then cratered and held a pretty steady bottom for multiple years as a 4th liner and now the coaching staff has him atleast finishing scoring chances at a 2nd line level, I wouldn't say he is driving the play at a 2nd line forward level, but the finish is there. In the salary cap era, you basically never have an ideal line-up and always have to make due with some substandard parts, but what Chia has given McLellan to work with is garbage.

A well managed team should be able to ice 2x 1st line forwards, 2x 2nd line forwards, 2x 3rd line forwards, and enough 4th line forwards to fill in the blanks. We just have a lot of dead cap from players who really aren't helping us win and every single one of them is the fault of the current GM with the exception of the Pouliot buy-out at $1.3M (though even there I think we bought him out one season too early stretching the cap penalty).

I stand by Chia being the person most deserving of being fired, the goalie coach being the 2nd most deserving, and McLellan being the 3rd most deserving. If the biggest issue is the GM, you generally don't go out and hire a new head coach, what tends to happen if things are really going poorly is you fire the head coach and give an assistant the job for the remainder of the season as an interim head coach and then you let the new GM pick his own guy or possibly stick with the interim head coach.

 

[Soundwave]

If you look at our roster and evaluate it honestly: (just focus on forwards for now)

• How many legit 1st line forwards do we have? I'd say 2 (McDavid & Drai)
• How many legit 2nd line forwards do we have? I'd say 1 (RNH)
• How many legit 3rd line forwards do we have? I'd say 1 (Rieder)

Everyone else is basically a 4th liner, with only Lucic and I'd say Spooner having a higher established level of play for a decent chunk of time. Lucic's hands are just gone right now, you might want to blame that on the coach cause of him losing his confidence, but I think it's just part of his game degrading and the league getting increasingly skewed towards speed that is pushing him towards being irrelevant. The reads Spooner is making on the ice are pretty darn questionable, we might be able to squeeze some 3rd line-ish point totals out of him, but it doesn't seem like he will be a net positive as a player, just too leaky defensively, just two games and I feel I got a sense why he was being used as a 4th liner in NYR. Then I'd say the present forward stand-out is Chiasson who was for all of about one season a 3rd liner who was seen as young and trending towards being a 2nd liner, then cratered and held a pretty steady bottom for multiple years as a 4th liner and now the coaching staff has him atleast finishing scoring chances at a 2nd line level, I wouldn't say he is driving the play at a 2nd line forward level, but the finish is there. In the salary cap era, you basically never have an ideal line-up and always have to make due with some substandard parts, but what Chia has given McLellan to work with is garbage.

A well managed team should be able to ice 2x 1st line forwards, 2x 2nd line forwards, 2x 3rd line forwards, and enough 4th line forwards to fill in the blanks. We just have a lot of dead cap from players who really aren't helping us win and every single one of them is the fault of the current GM with the exception of the Pouliot buy-out at $1.3M (though even there I think we bought him out one season too early stretching the cap penalty).

I stand by Chia being the person most deserving of being fired, the goalie coach being the 2nd most deserving, and McLellan being the 3rd most deserving. If the biggest issue is the GM, you generally don't go out and hire a new head coach, what tends to happen if things are really going poorly is you fire the head coach and give an assistant the job for the remainder of the season as an interim head coach and then you let the new GM pick his own guy or possibly stick with the interim head coach.

Not even necessarily talking strictly about Boston guys, also thinking towards recent high draft picks that played well in the past and he mentions he liked what he seen out of them when he watched them previously e.g. Reinhart, Connolly, Strome. Also a propensity for veteran role players he's seen quite a bit who are on the decline e.g. Gryba, Desharnais, and Korpiko

Absolutely spot on, someone actually willing to look at the roster without sentimentality glasses. The sad thing is McDavid, Drai, and RNH were already basically here before Chia got here (lets not even start with the nonsense that anyone else was going to be drafted the moment that golden ticket came up).

 

[Cloned]

That's great. Came in a loss to the Oilers too where Horcoff got a Hat Trick (!)

The scariest thing is that his description of his defense is perfectly accurate for the Oilers D as well.

 

[oil Leaks]

Personally, I give Gulutzan the intern status right now, then clean house in the offseason.

 

[Patch101]

It would obviously be Glen Glutzen.

Yup

 

[McFlash97]

Why cant we call Kruger or Nelson offer a 1-2 year no movement , cannot be fired contract and be like here you are your chance to be an NHL coach and if you do great your on. We fired Kruger on skype, how about call him up on Whataspp...seems to be a hit nowadays

 

[Todd from Leduc]

Yup

I think Glen will be a better fit as head coach here vs Calgary as he is more suited to a team with high end talent like what we have. Calgary was very skill starved last year and that’s why their breakout was so slow.

 

[Mr Tadakichi]

Would like Nels Toddon as well. Seems like the players enjoy being coached by him.

 

[MinimaMoralia]

For me, it’s between Keefe or Sutter. If we go Sutter, at least he understands our team build and we may be able to grind out a playoff appearance or two before the next rebuild.
Or roll the dice on Keefe. Maybe he’s the next Eakins. Maybe he gets the young guns going, adjusts lines, etc. Maybe he’ll get it going.

 

[Chet Manley]

The org has 3 or 4 interim head coaches just hanging around the office if the right candidate isn't available yet. Plus if Chai goes too it would give the new GM time to pick a coaching staff. As the season goes on, I can't imagine Katz/upper management is blind to this GM being a big part of McLellan's failure.

 

[Patch101]

I think Vigneault is worth talking about too, but ya Gully is the most obvious unless they like Viveiros.

 

[Gunnersaurus Rex]

Outside of McDavid & maybe Draisaitl & Nurse, most players have not improved under McClellan. Time for Todd to go. He's not getting anything from these players. You are wasting prime years from 97, 29, 93

 

[Canada Drai]

Heard from a secret source that Lowe and MacT are getting demoted to GM and coach respectively.

 

[Oilhawks]

I think Vigneault is worth talking about too, but ya Gully is the most obvious unless they like Viveiros.

Viveiros would be an interesting choice and could be the best gamble in house. GG, Yawney, and MacT (lol) are known quantities as NHL HC's.

 

[CornKicker]

Mclellan needs to start crushing double burgers and beers again. Fat Todd > skinny todd with a big head.

 

[Oilhawks]

I could see Brownlee's What Gives? take on the situation being the most likely outcome.

Chiarelli let go, K. Gretzky steps up (in interim hopefully), evaluates McLellan (good lord this should already be proven as well), and GG steps up as interim coach.

At the end of the season, hopefully the house is cleaned (Lowe, MacT, Howson et al) are gone and new staff gets to come in.