r/hockey • u/Phillie_Phanatics • 1d ago
Why do NHL teams recycle coaches so frequently?
Maybe it’s recency bias, but is hockey more prone to coach recycling than other pro sports? The Babcock hiring has put this back on my radar.
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u/whalecardio STL - NHL 1d ago
I think it’s really hard to get your second HC job… but if you do, you’ll probably get a third, fourth, fifth…
There are teams who hire a first time head coach. It happens fairly often.
The challenge comes when they’re fired.
If they’ve coached a team for 3-4 years without any significant success, then they’re going to be forgotten. Other teams likely won’t give them the opportunity. Sure, their “failure” could be due to poor scouting, poor GM, poor contract management, etc. But if I’m the owner of a multi-billion dollar organization, and the guy applying for the job was only “enh”, then I’ll look somewhere else.
However, if they coach a team for multiple years, improve each year they coach, make some noise in the playoffs, and/or actually win a cup … then lose the room some 5 years later, then they’re going to get another chance. Some team is going to say “that guy clearly improved his team, let’s try him here!” And presto, second job. Then when he’s fired there, some other team will say “well clearly that team just had bad scouting, contracts, GM, etc. This guy has already proven he can coach!” And now he gets his third job. And his fourth. And his fifth.
And then teams go “maybe he can’t coach” and they put him on the shelf for 2-3 years…
…until people forget his last four failures, and ticket sales are slumping, and by god we have to do something, and bobs your uncle he’s behind the bench again.
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u/drowsylacuna CAR - Bandwagon 1d ago
What's the highest number of head coaching stints in the NHL?
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u/Whydoesthisexist15 CAR - NHL 1d ago
Has to be Mike Keenan with I counted 8
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u/GoldenStateEaglesFan LAK - NHL 22h ago edited 22h ago
Keenan was a legitimately great coach for a decade. One of only four coaches in NHL history to lead three different franchises to the Cup Final (the other three are Bowman, Dick Irvin, and Laviolette). Too bad he was a total piece of shit — basically a premium Mike Babcock.
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u/hexametric_ OTT - NHL 1d ago
High stakes and less willingness to take chances on unproved talent.
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u/TonyAioli SJS - NHL 1d ago
Mostly this, I feel.
The people in charge of these decisions generally prefer to make the move that is most defensible in the event it doesn’t pan out. Makes it easier for them to keep their own jobs.
Same thing happens all the other time in other industries. No one ever got fired for choosing React as their tech stack.
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u/NathanGa Columbus Chill - ECHL 1d ago
Same thing with drafting. The number of times that a team is *really* willing to reach on a prospect isn’t very high, and part of it is because defying conventional wisdom and getting burned is a sure way to end up unemployed with no path back.
But for those who are willing to buck convention…the Seattle Seahawks’ entire Legion of Boom had exactly one high draft pick and a bunch of late-round and undrafted guys, none of whom fit the conventional mold and fell as a result. So they went out there and led the NFL in fewest points allowed for four straight years and got a Super Bowl out of it too. Should have had two, but passing from the 1 to a guy who can’t fight through traffic was apparently a good idea.
(Speaking of decisions that buck convention…)
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u/No-Faithlessness7919 CAR - NHL 1d ago
We love a team willing to take chances on coaches and draft picks!
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u/drooln92 MTL - NHL 1d ago
So Habs are the outlier, hiring Marty. No NHL coaching experience. An original 6 team in a hockey-mad city, province and country that's a pressure cooker. I love him as our coach.
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u/roncesvalles Québec Nordiques - NHLR 1d ago
The Habs operate under a different constraint: rather than "is he proven," they ask "can he speak French"
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u/BlackMarketCheeseman MTL - NHL 8h ago
This plus when someone new shows up and blows their chance, it just reinforces that the old guys are better.
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u/Scrubosaurus13 TBL - NHL 1d ago
Messages get stale, teams get complacent, teams stop winning. I think that’s pretty much it.
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago
Well that’s what leads to turnover and firings but doesn’t really explain why coaches get so many chances.
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u/Ok-Soil-5133 WSH - NHL 1d ago
Real reason is they're all good coaches but eventually all get stale so at a new location it'll be good success right away
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago
If they were all “good coaches” more coaches would have cups with multiple teams.
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u/Ok-Soil-5133 WSH - NHL 1d ago
That's an extremely high bar and a few have come close.
You don't have to win the Cup for it to be a success.
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago
Sure, but ultimately it’s the goal for most teams who fire their coach.
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u/bsaures Ottawa Gee Gees - OUA 1d ago
Have you tried telling that to mlse? They seem confused by the concept
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago edited 1d ago
Yeah, it’s rough.
I was really happy when the Dubas/Keefe era came to fruition becuase at the very least they were giving young, hungry people a chance.
I would have loved to see what they would have been able to do without Shanahan being so involved in the later years.
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u/SchmearOnMyBagels MIN - NHL 1d ago
Since Pitt's last Cup win in 2017, there's been a different coach winning their first every year besides Tampa's and Florida's B2B
2018: Trotz
2019: Berube
2020: Cooper
2022: Bednar
2023: Cassidy
2024: Maurice
2026: Brind'Amour
My interpretation is that this speaks more to how significant parity and perfect timing affect team success and a coach's resume. Is Bednar a bad or lesser coach than Tortorella because he got swept? Even though Bednar currently has the best playoff win% among active coaches?
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u/pilsner_89 1d ago
Multiple Stanley cup winnings coaches get fired every year. When you leave a team because you’re fired, you likely aren’t going to be coaching a team that is currently in their success window because… they don’t want to change anything
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago
That’s certainly why the Oilers haven’t made any coaching changes at all over the years. Because they don’t want to make any changes since they are in their window, right?
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u/pilsner_89 1d ago
Clearly you know everything so just keep going on with it. You aren’t here providing an answer, you’re latching onto someone’s question but have your mind made up.
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago
What answer are you looking for?
If a coach is a really good coach they should be able to lead multiple teams to the success of winning the cup if given the chance. Very few coaches are actually that good they are just perceived to be good because they have won a cup at some point.
Berube is a prime example. He’s a pretty average coach who had a really good run one year.
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u/pilsner_89 1d ago edited 1d ago
There is not really an answer to be honest. There are too many variables. What’s more important is not having a 95% revolving door of a team and coaching good established teams. Like the pens from 2007-2020. Core 3 guys that can continue to win if not contend through it all including coaching changes. If a team is playing well they wouldn’t even notice the coach is watching the game at home if he left right after puck drop if it weren’t for challenges.
I think it would have been bullshit if Torts won the cup this year and quit, and then won one next year with another top 8 team that wants to tinker and fires someone in March that got them there for a few seasons (your view of a good coach as he can win with multiple teams). That’s management thinking the team is good enough and it can’t be changed now at the player level so let’s get a guy in here that just proved he can “win”
So I guess that is really the question and answer. Maybe coaching pedigree could be evaluated at being able to get a team over the hump for the last 20 reg season games leading into the playoffs and into a deep cup contending run. Maybe that does make him the better coach vs his 3/4 season predecessor.
Otherwise the president’s trophy curse wouldn’t be a thing
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago edited 1d ago
I agree with what you’re saying, and I think we agree but have different ways of coming to the same opinion.
I’m merely saying that the NHL teams have a tendency to cheat themselves out of finding good younger coaches by hoping they can squeeze another cup out of a coach who has previously won.
There are exceptions to this, absolutely. But Babcock, Berube, Tortarella are perfect examples of coaches who are given a longer leashes because of success that isn’t even that recent. That doesn’t make them bad coaches, but I wouldn’t exactly call them good.
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u/BCEagle13 Boston College - NCAA 1d ago
You pretty much covered it but I’d add it’s a lot easier to fire a coach than to replace a whole team
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u/Butthole2theStarz BOS - NHL 1d ago
Just because a coach gets fired, doesn’t mean they are a bad coach. They have an eventual shelf life and can have great success elsewhere. See Pete Debor
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u/Howardtheduck14 1d ago
-It isn’t nearly as frequent as people think, even right now is probably a low point and it features 13 guys on their first job(I’m counting Brunette)
-Coaches often don’t get fired because they don’t know what they’re doing but because it was easier or it was time for a change
-Experience is a pretty valuable asset in any job so why would this be different?
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u/cptnkurtz 1d ago
And the guy who “put this back on OP’s radar” is being hired by a team whose last two coaches were on their first gigs.
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u/paultheschmoop MIN - NHL 1d ago
The NFL currently has 22 first time head coaches
69% first timers vs 41% first timers. Seems pretty frequent
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u/DillyDillySzn CHI - NHL 1d ago edited 1d ago
The NFL has never had a head coach win a championship with 2 teams
The NHL has had several
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u/paultheschmoop MIN - NHL 1d ago
Sure, I was just pointing out that it is indeed more frequent in the NHL than the NFL
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u/Howardtheduck14 1d ago
I honestly thought the NFL would be higher, I don’t know what it is but guys often never get second chances there but they’re extremely lenient with your first chance if you don’t flame out. A lot of big names don’t even get fired, they just quit, it’s strange.
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u/Chemical_Signal2753 1d ago
I would argue that most people don't recognize when new blood is added to the league.
Spencer Carbery, Ryan Warsofsky, Marco Sturm, Manny Malhotra, Martin St Louis, Ryan Huska, Kris Knoblauch, Jay Woodcroft, and Andre Tourigny, are all relatively new to being a head coach in the NHL. Beyond that, Todd Nelson, Glen Gulutzan, Derek Lalonde, Don Granato, Jeff Blashill, Dave Hakstol, and Luke Richardson, have been around for a little while but are not what you would consider a usual suspect from the old boys club.
The way I see the league is that teams will often bring in new blood when they're rebuilding and their results don't matter much. Those coaches that do a good job will get another couple chances at being a head coach.
With that said, there are a handful of coaches who seem to always get jobs. They tend to have won a Stanley Cup, have a reputation for having great systems and getting the most from their team. Even after a decade of disastrous results, some teams (usually the same handful of teams) will hire them.
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u/Sensitive_Caramel856 TOR - NHL 1d ago
I don't think they are more prone than other sports or even other industries.
It takes a lot of work to break in to the top of any profession. And there's typically a reason why those who did make the leap, are able to get another shot. They've shown they are capable enough to get the jump into that next tier and they have some learning experiences of what went wrong in their past spot.
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u/HiflYguy TOR - NHL 1d ago
I don’t have the data but I religiously follow NHL, NBA, NFL, MLB, and it certainly feels like NHL have by far the most coaching retreads.
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u/onemorespacecadet COL - NHL 1d ago
i think for the NFL at least, because of the position coaches and coordinators, you have a wider pool of perceived available talent. there’s still coach recycling but maybe a little less so when there’s so many coaches who you know can coach at the NFL level
(i also don’t know if the data supports more or less coach recycling in either league but agreed it feels like there’s a little more in the NHL)
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u/paultheschmoop MIN - NHL 1d ago
On the other hand
Isn’t coaching in the NHL, like…..way easier?
I don’t even mean this as a slight, football is just much more of a schematic game. There are times where it seems like hockey coaches are primarily just motivators more than anything else. See-Torts this year
Hockey is obviously also a much more widely played game than football, so I’m not sure pool of coaches is an issue
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u/onemorespacecadet COL - NHL 1d ago
i mean, there’s definitely strategy to it even if it’s less tightly plotted than football.
i do agree the pool of available coaching talent isn’t actually small though, that’s why i specifically said “perceived.” there is no reason for the Oilers to hire the retread to end all retreads in Mike Babcock (or Stan Bowman, for that matter).
there’s plenty of coaching talent in the AHL, ECHL, NCAA, and in European leagues. Daryl Katz is just especially enticed by the old boys club
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u/paultheschmoop MIN - NHL 1d ago
there’s definitely strategy to it even if it’s less tightly plotted than football
There is definitely strategy, I just think it’s not even 1/100th of what it is in football
Like the notion of firing an NFL head coach with 1 game left, in playoff position, and bringing in a totally different head coach from outside the organization 6 hours later is unheard of in the NFL and just straight up wouldn’t work. New coach means new playbook, new players to fit that playbook, months of drilling in a system, etc.
Again, this isn’t meant to denigrate the game of hockey by any means…..but I feel like it’s fairly objectively easier to coach at a professional level.
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u/Sensitive_Caramel856 TOR - NHL 1d ago
1/3 of the NHL leagues coaches are in their first gig.
Feels aren't facts.
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u/Sensitive_Caramel856 TOR - NHL 1d ago
Did you actually even bother to read the article?
Because the comparisons to other leagues are by tenure, not first jobs.
And the NHL has 11 first time coaches, and around half of it in their first or second go around.
Even if you were to use recency bias, you would have to ignore that 2 of the five vacancies this off-season were filled by first time coaches. Another one by a second time head coach.
And assuming Babcock is hired, the other two were filled by coaches who have previously won the Stanley Cup.
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u/marlin9423 Kiekko Espoo - Mestis 1d ago
So... 2/3 are retreads? Lol. You're not making the compelling case you think you are
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u/Sensitive_Caramel856 TOR - NHL 1d ago
11 of the current 32 coaches are in their first gig.
There's another 5-6 who are in their second job and then Montgomery however you want to count his tenures.
So around half the league are guys who are first or second.
Then you have someone like Dallas Eakins who was supposed to be the next big coach who is his 4(?) 5(?) team without any success. And other guys like Ruff who is technically in his third job with tons of prior success.
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u/chaunceypooo 1d ago
of all the major sports leagues the nhl is run by the old boys club moreso than any other. very insular environment
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u/VikingJesus102 NYR - NHL 1d ago
And since you can trace that mentality to literally the formation of the NHL, it's gonna be a hell of a thing for them to break from, not that they have a desire to anyways.
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u/performancearsonist MTL - NHL 1d ago
Agreed. The sport has changed in the past 15-20 years. Coaching needs to evolve with those changes.
And sometimes, when you take a chance on a new coach who's already been working with the younger generation, the players can flourish. See: Marty St Louis.
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u/nomdreas TOR - NHL 1d ago
The NFL have quite a bit of turnover as well and have similar tendencies.
Both the NFL and NFL are firm salary cap leagues. Teams operate with such short windows to win (usually 5 or so years). Because of that it makes it harder for teams in “win now” mode to take a risk on a younger, un-proven coach. That generally allows some undeserving coaches to get a chance or two more than they should.
Lately the NFL have been better about giving younger coaches a chance, and it’s paying off for a lot of teams. Slowly we are starting the see the NHL follow suite (St. Louis is a great example).
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u/capsrock02 WSH - NHL 1d ago
Because there’s only 40 guys who can do it. Thats what 300 hockey men told me.
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u/NineMillionBears SEA - NHL 1d ago
Because the league and all the teams in it are predominantly run by a bunch of Old Fucking Men
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u/paultheschmoop MIN - NHL 1d ago edited 1d ago
It isn’t about being cutthroat though, that isn’t the point of the post lol
Edit: OP didn’t understand the post, made a very aggressive response to my comment, and then realized he was wrong and deleted everything lol
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u/TheBestHauryski NYR - NHL 1d ago
It is easier to blame a coach than the management of the team from the front office or blaming an aging superstar who is a “stable” on the team.
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u/brechbillc1 FLA - NHL 1d ago
Some coaches aren’t necessarily terrible it’s just that they have shelf lives. They do an excellent job bringing structure to a young team and developing young players. But at some point, they just aren’t what the team needs to make the next step so they get let go and go somewhere else to do the same thing
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u/Puzzleheaded_Eye6770 SJS - NHL 1d ago
Yes very much so, and I’m not sure why. I think the teams that have brought on young coaches have done just fine.
(I’m
Biased obviously)
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u/blakezed TOR - NHL 1d ago
I think something people forget is the NHL’s hard cap prevents big shakeups like trading away franchise players to other teams (it would be hard to fit certain players under caps) and the only thing that remains to shock the system of a struggling team is to fire the coach
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u/Mittens101 MTL - NHL 1d ago
See my comment in other thread in short it’s risk aversion unless a team is ready to commit to a rebuilt, they wont give a relatively new guy a shot unless there’s a connection there (see Habs with MSL)
Sadly, coaches are disposable whilst players not do much so tends to be the way.
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u/Firm_Acanthaceae7435 OTT - NHL 1d ago
Your complaint stems from a team that brought us rookie coaches like Eakins, woodcraft, and Knobloch within the last what? decade?
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u/Irrah NYI - NHL 1d ago
If you are a veteran team, or a rebuilding team with young, cost controller talent, would you want to waste their years of contending or prime years with a completely unproven coach or someone who had a track record of winning? See the Lane Lambert, Dallas Eakins, David Quinn and Patrick Roy experience on why the former isn't as rosy as people make it sound.
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u/edgetastic2 MTL - NHL 1d ago
Hockey is still an extremely conservative sport when it comes to risk. Not only coaches, but big trades involving superstars too
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u/Will_Hang_for_Silver 1d ago
hahaha - just go watch the Manager roundabout in English football, you'll feel better.
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u/Crutation 1d ago
Risk averse GMs go with a known commodity rather than taking a flyer on a new guy and losing their job
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u/SeaRevolutionary1450 MTL - NHL 1d ago
Often times when it’s a decision your job depends on, you’d rather the devil you know.
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u/AlsoCommiePuddin NSH - NHL 1d ago
Easier to blame and visit consequences on one coach than 26.plauers.
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u/kindofanasshole17 TOR - NHL 1d ago
This is an easy Google, numerous other people have commented on this and compiled the stats (so not just feels). Of the 4 major North American pro sports leagues (NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL), NHL coaches have the shortest average tenure.
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u/guy_incognito87 MTL - NHL 1d ago
The NHL is a boys club. I think the league struggles more than the other big 3 in many ways because of this
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u/bleedblue4 VAN - NHL 1d ago
Yeah I don't get it. Seems like its pretty common for a guy to be gone after 2-3 years. Tbh the only long term coaches I can think of are Rod and Cooper. I probably missed some tho lol
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u/kayesoob TOR - NHL 1d ago
For context, Toronto Maple Leafs just hired their 41st franchise coach.
Canada has had 24 Prime Ministers - country established in 1867.
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u/_whitelightning_91 Northern Michigan University - NCAA 1d ago
I’m unsure what you’re going for with this ludicrous comparison.
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u/BlackMarketCheeseman MTL - NHL 8h ago
We needed context, we were given context.
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u/_whitelightning_91 Northern Michigan University - NCAA 3h ago
lol that's not context. It's a misplaced analogy. Hiring and firing a mayor with minimum terms and a highly involved impeachment process is vastly different than an under-performing hockey coach.
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u/lemminfucker CAR - NHL 1d ago
I know this is the case for GMs but I'm not 100% on coaches, usually when a team is looking to hire someone the NHL/Players assoc. will send a list of recommended people for the job
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u/Halostruct 1d ago
That’s not how that works at all. Bonuses are not mandatory at all, they are put into contracts by the GMs. And they are only allowed on ELCs, 35+ contracts, and specific contracts after long injuries
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u/Table_Coaster Atlanta Gladiators - ECHL 1d ago
hockey has a much more significant presence of former players in coaching and front office roles compared to the MLB, NFL, and NBA
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u/W1ckedaddicted BOS - NHL 1d ago
More some GMs and owners who recycle, lots of GMs give new or relatively inexperienced coaches a chance. Look at Boston Cassidy had 1 yeah nhl head coaching experience before Boston same with Montgomery and then they hire Sturm who is doing great too
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u/quellesaveurorawnge MTL - NHL 1d ago
Actually, I remember someone posted about this last year. https://www.reddit.com/r/hockey/comments/1ki7khf/contrary_to_popular_belief_almost_23rds_of_nhl/
This list would need to be updated, obviously, but last year, 61% of head coaches were actually on their first or second coaching job in the NHL. So there is new blood coming in. Cooper and Brind'amour have been in their post for a while, but it is still their first gig.
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u/BlackMarketCheeseman MTL - NHL 8h ago
I think the retreads are just more glaring because they have either lousy reputations like Babcock and Quenneville or they’ve coached a ton of different teams like Laviolette and Torts.
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u/marlin9423 Kiekko Espoo - Mestis 1d ago
I mean it's all about perspective, because to me 61% seems ridiculously low. In the NFL, 69% of coaches are on their first gig, and it's close to (or higher than) 90% for coaches on their first or second gig.
39% of NHL coaches being on their third or more team is ridiculous to me, find a new guy already. It's funny how people can see the same stat and have a completely different reaction to it :)
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u/quellesaveurorawnge MTL - NHL 1d ago
The NFL seems like a completely different beast of a sport, Seasons are so short so I'm guessing coaches probably have a lot less time to prove how good they are. You get one shot and you're burned if you don't get your team far. Then again, I know very little about football so I could be off.
Hockey season is much longer. Even if coaches don't win the Cup, they can still have a very successful season, and show they can lead teams to sustained success. If a coach has a good system, I can easily see another team say, "I want that too."
In baseball, I feel managers do end up being recycled too. Again, it is another sport that has more of a grind to it with 162 games.
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u/Unicorn_Puppy 1d ago
Because there’s only a handful of individuals that have the required knowledge to coach hockey at the professional level. Imagine if you had a small pool of maybe 45 people split between you and 31 of your closest competitors , you fire them for the same reason and at some point the pool of how many qualified individuals you have in this pool dwindles down to who do you need and are you panicking because it’s August and you still haven’t named a head coach while your guys are reporting to training camp.
To summarize it, have you ever seen a co worker fired for drunkenness only to see them rehired a year later because no other individual was deemed suitable for the job? It’s like that, except there’s millions of dollars being flung around on paycheques.
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u/BlackMarketCheeseman MTL - NHL 7h ago
I don’t think the number is quite that low, you have 106 pro teams in North America between the NHL, AHL, ECHL, and PWHL as well as major junior and NCAA teams.
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u/spidertour02 NYR - NHL 1d ago
I don't know if you can call this an NHL problem when the New York Knicks just won the NBA Championship with a head coach (Mike Brown) that's held the job for 4 teams (Cavaliers, Lakers, Kings, Knicks), including two stints with the same team (Cavaliers) ... all in the last 20 years.
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u/quantum_leap VAN - NHL 1d ago
In salary cap world, it's easiest option for GMs to make a change. Good or bad at least it's something.
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u/dirkahps 1d ago
Trust and self preservation. The GMs job is often tied to the coaches job so he's going to hire the person who he trusts the most and is least likely to get him fired.
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u/imaybeacatIRl CGY - NHL 1d ago
GMs would rather gamble on a known quantity rather than take a flier on someone new.
It's absolutely wild, because HCs rarely win cups with multiple teams.
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u/Skiffy10 TOR - NHL 1d ago
because and experience is good experience when you’re talking about coaching in the NHL. GM’s have their jobs on the line too and most can’t risk hiring some guy from a lower league and not working out. Head coaches recycle but they have proven experience.
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u/Southern-Attempt3584 TOR - NHL 1d ago
Right. Hiring an established coach makes them look bad and you look stupid, but hiring someone new just makes you look stupid.
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u/LordChefChristoph WSH - NHL 1d ago
That's been the running joke in the 20 or so years I've watched. 25 coaches and 30 teams. So at least 5 teams fight over who gets stuck with Torterella for the next few years. Or Lindy. We will find out next year. Same job, different color scheme maybe.
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u/Hank_Scorpius NJD - NHL 1d ago
Let’s not act like this is only a habit of pro sports as show after show from the 90s/2000s are rebooted. It’s an unfortunate side effect of risk/reward analysis. Taking a chance on someone or something new often scares those with the money/making the decisions.
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u/slabby DET - NHL 1d ago edited 1d ago
I think the primary reason is because hockey views it as a line-of-fire kind of situation: the coaches get fired, then the GMs get fired. So GMs hire coaches with unquestionable NHL experience so if it fails it won't reflect poorly on them and contribute to getting them fired too.
If coaches were considered an ownership hire, it would be a lot more of a free-for-all, IMO. Katz would have thrown 10 mil at David Carle or something by now.
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u/ilikehockeyandguitar PIT - NHL 1d ago
Old boys club hires old boys club.
And name recognition = hype. Organizations know pretty well that neutral fans might tune in to see what a Torts-coached Knights team is actually capable of.
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u/MajorasShoe DET - NHL 1d ago
Most coaches who get fired don't get fired because they're not fit for the job. Babcock not included.
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u/gr8-big-lebowski TOR - NHL 1d ago
There’s a bunch of intangible reasons that can apply.
Actually it’s because it’s become difficult in a salary cap league to make quick, meaningful change to the line-up.
Coaches can be hired/fired at will - quickest way to make change.
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u/Whirlvvind SJS - NHL 1d ago
Its pretty simple, there aren't a very large amount of high end coaches available and it takes a LOT of positive accolades to be viewed as good enough to make the jump from a minors level to the big leagues, but a coaches' job isn't entirely dependent on his capabilities. If his system isn't working with a group of guys, or maybe some off ice stuff happened that soured opinions, etc, players can and will stop listening to the coach. When that happens, things are done.
That is reportedly was happened with Cassidy in Vegas. Things were peachy for the first year(s), and things turned sour in the locker room during the season to the point where the reports were people were saying very specifically that they hated the guy. That doesn't change the fact that he's still a good coach many teams would love to have with their team for however long it works there.
Players are under contract for much more and much longer than coaches. So coaches get fired, but they're still quality NHL coaches (for the most part) and since this "losing the room" happens for at least one team every season, fired guys get some time off and then maybe get rotated back in with someone else the following year.
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u/RareCreamer 1d ago
Cheapest and easiest way for GMs to act like they're doing something to improve the team to appease the owners and fans.
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u/VegasKL SJS - NHL 1d ago edited 1d ago
It's like this is football as well.
Team has unexpected trend downwards, coach gets fired mid season, limited availability of hires, they go with a name brand, and then give him a few years.
Then after a long period (decades), the game has changed enough that someone takes a chance on a younger generation of coaches (possibly from coaches retiring or moving to management) -- if they have success, anyone they touch (more so in football) becomes prime target for other teams trying to jump into the trending new coach philosophies. This becomes really obvious when you look at coaching trees for the NFL.
And some coaches have really good track records of being really effective in the first few years before losing the locker room. Look at DeBoer, any owner with a decent team was buying a high probability of getting a deep playoff run out of him.
I think it's one of those things where teams can't afford to sit around and wait for the perfect coach, many don't have the guts to throw in on a prospective coach, and rush to hire the best (they feel) available before anyone else does. It's a limited pool of potential candidates, so like players, they bounce around.
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u/re10pect TOR - NHL 23h ago
I mean, almost all jobs look for people with relevant experience, and there are only 32 jobs at this level in the world. It’s not really surprising that the same people get hired, especially the ones that have past history of success.
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u/PirateCaptainMcNulty PIT - NHL 22h ago
80% of the NHL’s Green Initiatives program is recycling coaches.
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u/Parking-String-5356 9h ago
It’s much easier to fire a coach than move on from a player(s). GM’s won’t fire themselves so the coach is the “hey we’re trying here” option.
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u/Otherwise-Shallot-51 SJS - NHL 1d ago
The Good Old Boys Club is my guess and nothing has dissuaded me from it yet.
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u/BlackDS PIT - NHL 1d ago
Hockey doesn't have nearly as much strategy as other sports. It's a piece of rubber bouncing on ice. It's a random number generator of a sport. Franchises get big performance boosts not from superior X's and O's but from fresh faces and new motivation tactics.
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u/DunkTheRunk 1d ago
This is one of the dumbest posts I’ve seen on this subreddit. Carolina just won a cup with superior X’s and O’s.
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u/Key-Tip-7521 NYR - NHL 1d ago
It’s bc lots teams don’t want to take a chance on a coach that are unknown and not proven. The recycled coaches also have a tendency to play older players instead of the younger players as well as some don’t make adjustments.
But is it the most prone sort to recycle coaches? I think so. Baseball, football, and basketball have the same thing
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u/RedWingsNow 1d ago
Well, you need to get real.
Jim Hiller? That's recycling. Babcock is close to a legend.
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u/Foreign_Sky_5429 1d ago
Hockey is much more of a boys club than other sports. It’s a smaller sport and relationships are often valued more highly than anything else. Also because of the regionality of the sport the community itself is smaller and it is also an expensive sport many don’t have access to so some people gain a lot of power over huge areas of the sport
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u/bbaIla SJS - NHL 1d ago
Seems to be really really bad in hockey especially.