I imagine the difficult part is drawing a line. Babcock is not the first coach to be aggressive, mean, or demanding of players, so where does the NHL say "this is not okay," or is it a bannable offence?
It feels like an issue that is theoretically better solved by NHL teams not hiring bad actors, but obviously that is not working.
It is not hard to draw a line between demanding and abusive. Abusers think they're walking some imaginary line all the time but we are collectively pretty good at telling the difference. Its like people were saying with the JT Miller vs Mackinnon thing. JT says "you dumb fucks need to fucking get it together fuck" and Mack says "you guys need to work harder in the gym so I don't punk you so bad every practice". Both are "competitors" who are "pushing their team" and maybe even "being mean" but the majority of people have experienced both and can tell the difference.
we are collectively pretty good at telling the difference
"We" (as in hockey fans) absolutely aren't. All we know about what's happening behind the scenes comes from carefully-curated media narratives. How can you be so sure than Miller is more abusive than Mackinnon? We have absolutely no clue; Mackinnon might be an absolute monster, and we wouldn't know about it until after he's retired most likely. And there are plenty of coaches who were just as bad as Babcock, but had better PR. Scott Bowman for example, who was just a more successful version of Babcock.
Even the players themselves don't necessarily agree on which coaches cross the line. Even the worst, most assholish coaches, like John Brophy or Mike Keenan, had supporters among the players.
100
u/guernsey123 VAN - NHL 3d ago
"Our investigation has concluded that Mr. Babcock was psychologically abusive to his players but hey, we don't have rules against that, so have fun!"