Replacement. Surely you jest sir, nobody ever has had the last word with you… especially not on any current crusade, which this has become.
But how about this:
Connor gets what Connor wants
And as a follow up:
This young man is among the top five hockey players in history. He didn’t get there because he lacks understanding of the game. And he didn’t get there because he lacks pure competitiveness and desires excellence from himself and those around him.
He knew (past tense) Brown and vouched for him. Connor Brown knew Connor Brown and vouched for himself. They both got it wrong, much of what made him a great teammate has passed him by…
It wasn’t a conspiracy, or even a terrible bet, he was young enough to recover… but nevertheless he/McD/Holland/we all came out on the wrong side of that bet. Nobody’s perfect.
You need to let it go.
Well, Connor, like any human may have preferences for certain types of individuals, personality types and a lot of this in humans operates unconsciously. Gets into the very meat of who we dislike, like. Best people in their fields are not immune to these types of influences and can often be unaware of them.
Next, familiarity is a major bias with humans. We tend to like that which we know including which people we know, or have known. This features very much in orgs, bureaucracies, teams etc and can lead to the kinds of hiring practices that are commonly viewed as nepotism, for lack of more accurate terms. Where this leads is that often in orgs, teams etc best person known maybe end up being hired over best available person. We tend to see this a lot in the Oilers org historically. Connor is not unique in this, he's just the latest to have this kind of influence and personal bias.
This leads to basic examination of whether known familiarity and preferences is really servicing best available team work. People tend to be at best while being challenged, even challenged by others as you are doing in this post. But this is helpful, and its my belief we all require this. Its a very important feedback mechanism. Indeed some of our learning can come painfully from confrontation. I've worked in such realms.
When I hear the Oilers talk specifically about team concept its very common to hear "he fits in real well" "players are real comfortable with him" "good in the room" and so on. This not being isolated to the Oilers but exists in a lot of teams. However I've read a lot of hockey bios and coach bios and historically it isn't always the team that is comfortable, or friends, or going out with each other etc that achieves excellence. It can often be teams that feature discord, for instance the challenging and very direct to a point leadership of say Mark Messier. Many past coaches also could be very confrontive, painfully so. But the thing is such interaction can be hard, difficult,. It can feel threatening, in the moment divisive, result in lots of emotions.
I'm sure you've had work experiences where you disliked somebody or a manager, coworker and later found out that the persons input, style, while uncomfortable may result in positive gains, different outlooks, varied perspective etc. This Oilers team, not for the first time but chronic with this org, has had dives into these comfort and familiarity patterns. The org has even recognized this and hired some shake it up people at times that were direct. The intention being to increase difficulty, even going as far to do a "bootcamp". (to me poorly executed and conceived) I could write a lot more on this due to it being around my wheel house. But its far over and above discussion on a hockey forum. if you wanted I could go into much more depth. Suffice now to say though that the major overview is not blame of McDavid for this, he just falls into patterns humans invariably can feel. He's in an incredibly challenging environment. The comfort of familiarity and having some people around from less stressful times would be like a drug. Not his fault. Perhaps the org is sensing the value in that and looking off Browns specific performance.
But for Connor Brown my view is different. One has to know when one is done. I had this voyage myself so I'm not speaking out of turn here or on something I don't know of. The first person to look at self and know that they can no longer meet challenges of a very stressful work environment or occupation ultimately needs to be oneself. I could have continued to make good income in my field. I got out when I should. Thats honest, and its best practice for all involved. Connor Brown is not just failing on ice, he's failing in his cognitions of present performance. Not sure if you've seen the two articles but Matheson and I think it was Spector, but they had extensive articles with Connor Brown where Brown himself is saying such things as He's still got it, all it takes is for a goal to go in, that everything will just come then. It is denial at this point.
But thank you foremost for challenging me. Now, and almost always.
cheers
