A small thought re: player development

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

For my sins, I've been living in Vancouver for the past few years. Over all this time, GMs Nonis and Gillis have spent 1/2 hour per week on local sports radio, answering questions from the hosts and fans who call in. Before that it was Burke, and while I wasn't around then, I'm pretty sure that arsehole engaged the media regularly.

Over the Gainey years, there was no equivalent communication with Habs fans. He would occasionally do an interview and as coach, he would give guarded (and often snarky) press conferences. But really - no steady, regular line of communication between GM and fans.

What I've been wondering is whether this has contributed to the completely unreal, pathological attitude of fans in Montreal, especially regarding young players. Look at the Sedin twins. For years and years, they were derided by fans as a disappointment. GM after GM could be heard regularly arguing the case, that young players need time to develop (Burke), and later that emerging stars need time to learn the playoff process (Nonis, Gillis). Whatever the failings of that organization, it never wavered on its faith in those young men. And they have been rewarded. Meanwhile, the fans and media here are just as idiotic as in Montreal, BUT popular discussion has to constantly factor in the arguments of management. Surely that makes a difference.

I know that Gainey defended guys like O'Byrne and Price fiercely at specific moments. What he did not do was defend them, and other young guys like Latendresse, on the kind of day-to-day, week-in-and-week-out basis that Vancouver GMs have done. But maybe that's exactly what the fans and media need: a relentless, patient, ongoing and direct engagement with fans over their expectations and evaluations of the team (and especially its youth). Otherwise, the lunatics end up alone on the playing field.

Is it possible that this sort of strategy might help to level out the insanity in Montreal, just a bit? Maybe creating a more hospitable culture in which young players can learn the game? Or am I dreaming? What do you think?

[fromage]

Less contact with fans, the better.

[Prime Minister Koivu]

Communication always helps and can often stop ugliness from developing. I wonder about Boivin and Gautier though. They both come across as crowd pleasers or politicians (read full of shit), at least they seem that way to me.

The fan mania has always existed and will likely remain. Remember the media/fan beatings that Roy took?

The only thing that stops the nonsense is winning. If we were in first place everything would be groovy. It doesn't help that we have struggled so badly for so many years...

Solution is simple, win every game and the cup every year

[Colin]

My poor, poor grown-up pickle.

You have such flights of fancy sometimes. Imagine - a team that communicated regularly with its fans and allowed them and the media to understand the processes through which the team was being developed. In what kind of transparent lunatic fringe are you living, my Chicoutamic Gurkin?

How can you possibly think it would be of any use at all to allow people to understand management's philosophy or to educate them on the developmental process? I'm sure you're the deluded type of person who believes that - *snort* - education is vital to success in this society.

Allow me to guffaw.

And then you proceed to use the Bobsy Twins as example of why this kind of transparancy and education could reap rewards with the proper application of patience.

You silly, silly Cuke.

[Zowpeb]

Really...a Bobsy Twins reference...lol

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

My poor, poor grown-up pickle.

You have such flights of fancy sometimes. Imagine - a team that communicated regularly with its fans and allowed them and the media to understand the processes through which the team was being developed. In what kind of transparent lunatic fringe are you living, my Chicoutamic Gurkin?

How can you possibly think it would be of any use at all to allow people to understand management's philosophy or to educate them on the developmental process? I'm sure you're the deluded type of person who believes that - *snort* - education is vital to success in this society.

Allow me to guffaw.

And then you proceed to use the Bobsy Twins as example of why this kind of transparancy and education could reap rewards with the proper application of patience.

You silly, silly Cuke.

I'll take that as a 'YES' to my argument.

[ehjay]

Thank You The Chicoutimi Cucumber,

I say this cuz I was wondering when tis would come up. Every major (even a lot of the REAL tiny one's) Co. has some snot of 'regular' exchange with they clients about the direction they are/going to take. Hell even the legal mafia that robs my pay chk does that. Mostly to tell me how they figured out another 'legal' way to take my money but what do I know.

I thnk this would be great for the Habs, as you said just to give day in day out support to they young palyers. That alone would justify 1/2 a week agains the nuts out there. I would do it for them. I would love to be a Habs rep on the radio and defend/support players. Obviously they would not be able to give a straight line in the radio but a 7 sec delay should catch all the swears I would hand out to some.

I also think refs should stand against the media to answer for them selfves at times. But as I have been told this would not be justifiable in the regular season (unless of a major f*** up), but in the palyoffs....

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

Further to this...Boivin basically announced when Gainey resigned that bilingualism is an absolute prerequisite for the job of being Habs' GM because the Habs are part of a French-speaking community, etc.. But what is the point of this if the GM is only going to communicate with fans on rare occasions anyway? EITHER the Habs go with a policy of hiring the very best people regardless of language, OR they go with a policy of regular, open communication from the GM, preferably directly with fans (as in a weekly appearance on a radio call-in show). What we have now is the worst of both worlds. :?-

Edited February 15, 2010 by The Chicoutimi Cucumber

[Colin]

Further to this...Boivin basically announced when Gainey resigned that bilingualism is an absolute prerequisite for the job of being Habs' GM because the Habs are part of a French-speaking community, etc..

Which is fine, but fans should accept, and ownership and management should be forthright, with the fact that this is a business and that winning the Cup is secondary. All those who feel there is a 'mystique' to wearing the jersey, that history means something, that tradition is everything? They need to re-think. Ultimately, with this statement, Boivin unequivocably proved that the Montreal Canadiens are a BUSINESS franchise, and not a sporting franchise.

As long as they can keep tricking people into coming to the rink, and as long as they continue making money hand over fist, they'll not choose the BEST person for the job, but rather the best person with an asterisk. (Of course, this doesn't necessarily mean that the best person isn't bilingual, rather it means the club has automatically discluded the large majority of hockey men. If the best bilingual guys are already working elsewhere, it means we get Reggie Houle over, say, Lou Lamoriello. Read: Epic Fail.)

And THIS is the reason why we don't ever go into full rebuild and why we don't overpay when we see the possibility to get something which could conceivably give us a massive short-term Cup potential over long-term mediocrity. That mediocrity is good enough since it generates playoff revenue and keeps the fans interested enough to fill the building and keep buying anything related to the CH.

If the Canadiens were committed to winning, things would be a lot different.

[Toronthab]

Which is fine, but fans should accept, and ownership and management should be forthright, with the fact that this is a business and that winning the Cup is secondary. All those who feel there is a 'mystique' to wearing the jersey, that history means something, that tradition is everything? They need to re-think. Ultimately, with this statement, Boivin unequivocably proved that the Montreal Canadiens are a BUSINESS franchise, and not a sporting franchise.

As long as they can keep tricking people into coming to the rink, and as long as they continue making money hand over fist, they'll not choose the BEST person for the job, but rather the best person with an asterisk. (Of course, this doesn't necessarily mean that the best person isn't bilingual, rather it means the club has automatically discluded the large majority of hockey men. If the best bilingual guys are already working elsewhere, it means we get Reggie Houle over, say, Lou Lamoriello. Read: Epic Fail.)

And THIS is the reason why we don't ever go into full rebuild and why we don't overpay when we see the possibility to get something which could conceivably give us a massive short-term Cup potential over long-term mediocrity. That mediocrity is good enough since it generates playoff revenue and keeps the fans interested enough to fill the building and keep buying anything related to the CH.

If the Canadiens were committed to winning, things would be a lot different.

I don't know about that Colin. Trust me. I don't know. BUT. THis is Montreal, a hockey place, not an accounting place. Mr G had a number of priorities to attend to along with winning a cup which he tied to do in 2008 but was derailed by awful injuries.

He also had to field a real live hockey team worth watching every year which he has done pretty well including this year with a major rework to boot. He couldn't just blow it up and fail to compete because this is not a sports move but a chess or accounting trick; cheating in fact, and Mr G isn't like that IMAO.

I don't think its a compromise with mediocrity at all. If the Price were right.. and I hear that there are significant discipline issues bottled up in this, then we might bhe looking at a rather different scenario.

I have loved Mr G's march to respectability while putting together some of the highest scoring teams in the league. This year's a nailbiter , but frankly a GM can only make the best moves available to him and let the chips fall where they may. It ain't magic and it ain't foolproof.

I really think Mr Gainey, a world class sportsman and excellent executive did what he had to do to bring good to very good hockey to a city that loves him and that he loves. And I think he largely succeeded within the parameters I mentionned. I don't respect teams that tank and trade off their game so that they might try to win some other year. That's just business, not sports and one can hardly fault players who show the same reserved intensity for salary reasons in that kind of a world.

But as I was saying, what the hell do I know?

[Wamsley01]

For my sins, I've been living in Vancouver for the past few years. Over all this time, GMs Nonis and Gillis have spent 1/2 hour per week on local sports radio, answering questions from the hosts and fans who call in. Before that it was Burke, and while I wasn't around then, I'm pretty sure that arsehole engaged the media regularly.

Over the Gainey years, there was no equivalent communication with Habs fans. He would occasionally do an interview and as coach, he would give guarded (and often snarky) press conferences. But really - no steady, regular line of communication between GM and fans.

What I've been wondering is whether this has contributed to the completely unreal, pathological attitude of fans in Montreal, especially regarding young players. Look at the Sedin twins. For years and years, they were derided by fans as a disappointment. GM after GM could be heard regularly arguing the case, that young players need time to develop (Burke), and later that emerging stars need time to learn the playoff process (Nonis, Gillis). Whatever the failings of that organization, it never wavered on its faith in those young men. And they have been rewarded. Meanwhile, the fans and media here are just as idiotic as in Montreal, BUT popular discussion has to constantly factor in the arguments of management. Surely that makes a difference.

I know that Gainey defended guys like O'Byrne and Price fiercely at specific moments. What he did not do was defend them, and other young guys like Latendresse, on the kind of day-to-day, week-in-and-week-out basis that Vancouver GMs have done. But maybe that's exactly what the fans and media need: a relentless, patient, ongoing and direct engagement with fans over their expectations and evaluations of the team (and especially its youth). Otherwise, the lunatics end up alone on the playing field.

Is it possible that this sort of strategy might help to level out the insanity in Montreal, just a bit? Maybe creating a more hospitable culture in which young players can learn the game? Or am I dreaming? What do you think?

Would this really make a difference? I would hope it would, but Gainey comes out and says he wants to trade Halak

and within a month it has been spun to a degree that Price is on the block.

Every single fan has a personal bias and usually when it is set in motion, it is of zero consequence what the GM has

to say. The ball begins to roll and doesn't stop until a Stanley Cup is won.

Ken Dryden won 5 cups in 7 seasons and was booed in warmup during the Stanley Cup Finals. Patrick Roy

won two Stanley Cups, 3 Vezinas and was a perennial All-Star and was booed off the ice for a bad game.

You win or you are tough enough to take the BS. There is no other way.

[jackp]

Ken Dryden won 5 cups in 7 seasons and was booed in warmup during the Stanley Cup Finals.

I remember Dryden being booed before that Ranger series. The reason was because he was not particularly good in the previous 7 game series against Boston. (You know, the one where Cherry gets up on the bench and bows to the crowd. I was at that last game btw. I have never heard the Forum so loud when Lambert scored the winner in overtime. I had to shout into my buddy's ear just to get him to hear anything. After, outside the forum, people were honking their horns as they left their parking.)

Personally, I moved from loving Dryden in his first years, to having a small feeling of distaste concerning him. Those were the years when I had the season tickets ringside, 3 seats over from the Habs bench (before they moved the visitor's bench there when the NHL insisted both teams be on the same side). We were so powerful then, that we'd often build a big lead. This would result in us getting a little careless defensively at the end of the game. I can't tell you how many times Dryden would skate pissed off, through the team trying to congratulate him. The glass was shorter in those days, and I sometimes would yell at him, "You're lucky you're on this team. You wouldn't have such a great record if you weren't." It would just piss me off so much to see him acting the way he was.

One time, there were these two old ladies sitting in Rolly Nadeau's seats, right next to the Habs bench. There was no glass separating the fans from the players then, and Bunny Larocque was playing, so they were sitting right next to Dryden. It was obvious that he was one of their heroes, and they kept hinting how much they admired him, etc. You think the guy would just turn and at least give them a smile during the game? No way. He completely ignored them. Maybe he was just shy at the time, but it ticked me off, and the ladies were obviously disappointed by game's end.

Still, he did write the best book I've ever read about hockey. And I loved his speech at the last Liberal convention where he talked so eloquently about what it meant to be a Canadian.

I know I've wandered off topic here but I have one last story for those who are interested in the more personal piccadiloes of some of the Habs from years gone by. This next one concerns Jean Beliveau, and I present it as a contrast to how Dryden acted.

This happened in the late 60's, when my dad had the season tickets and would often give them away to customers. So, this particular time, I was standing in line early Saturday morning to get standing room tickets for that night's game against Boston. There was a long line, and in front of me was what I would uncharitably call "a bag lady," poorly dressed, teeth not well taken care of, etc.

Anyway, the Habs were coming in for the morning skate, and most were just cutting through the line. Not Jean Beliveau. He stopped in front of this lady and said, "Excusez-moi madame." And only when she pulled back in more than a little shock, did Beliveau proceed past her. A small story but it just highlights the class and humility that oozed from that man.

[ForumGhost]

Best Olympic goalie thus far = Halak

Highest scoring Olympic forward thus far = Sergei Kostitsyn

[alexstream]

Best Olympic goalie thus far = Halak

Highest scoring Olympic forward thus far = Sergei Kostitsyn

is there a website for stats?

[jackp]

Best Olympic goalie thus far = Halak

He actually scares me if we have to play Slovakia anytime during this tournament. He's already held Russia to 1 goal. Hopefully, if we do play them, he'll have one of his "off" days.

[lazy26]

is there a website for stats?

http://www.iihf.com/channels10/olympics-2010/statistics.html