Late in tumultuous 1991-92 season, which included the ill-fated trade that sent Doug Gilmour, Doug Risebrough, gave up the coaching reins to concentrate on his general manager duties. Columnist Eric Duhatschek said it was too-little, too-late.
Late in tumultuous 1991-92 season, which included the ill-fated trade that sent Doug Gilmour, Doug Risebrough, gave up the coaching reins to concentrate on his general manager duties. Columnist Eric Duhatschek said it was too-little, too-late.
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All along, the plan was for Doug Risebrough to kick himself upstairs once this season ended.
So last week, when Risebrough, the Calgary Flames’ general manager, decided to fire Risebrough, the coach, he only pushed up the original schedule by a month—and for whatever time the Flames last in the playoffs, if indeed they make the playoffs.
Now there was nothing wrong with Risebrough’s decision, only with its timing. If he’d done it in November or September, they may not be in the fine mess they’re in.
Risebrough admitted it at his own news conference: There is not enough time in the day to do the two jobs properly, especially if this is your sophomore year as a coach and your rookie year as a GM.
He’s right of course. My question: Why did it take him this long to figure it out? People have been telling him that since the day he took over from Cliff Fletcher last spring.
In sifting through all the things that went wrong in Calgary this season, maybe Risebrough’s biggest mistake was listening to the wrong people.
First, there were the people who told him he needed to dismantle his hockey club-that as it was currently constituted, it wasn’t going anywhere. How did they rationalize that?
The Flames were coming off a 100-point season, which followed a 99-point season, which followed their Stanley Cup championship. They lost a playoff series in April, 1991 in overtime of the seventh game on a deflected shot to the defending Stanley Cup champions. This is an excuse for major surgery?
Then he listened to the people pressing him to trade Doug Gilmour and four other players to Toronto for Gary Leeman and the rest of those Maple Leafs.
Down the road, Risebrough’s ability to assess players will be a key to his success as a general manager. Maybe if he’d been a full-time GM back in January, he would have assessed the players coming his way from Toronto better than he did.
As it was, he relied on the advice of his lieutenants before pulling the trigger on the deal—and they were badly misinformed.
That’s too bad because Risebrough will always take the heat for the deal with the Leafs-a deal that turned a good team having a mediocre season into a mediocre team having a poor season.
In trying to salvage something from this year, Risebrough turned the coaching reins over to Guy Charron. That was the right choice. Charron will be a players’ coach, Calgary’s first since Bob Johnson. As Marc Habscheid put it: “If you can’t play for him, you can’t play for anybody.”
But it’s a sad commentary on the state of the game today that such a move was necessary. With the fragile egos that you see in NHL players today, GMs almost need to follow a pattern in changing their coaches.
First rule of thumb: Nobody, not even the second coming of Toe Blake, lasts more than five years. By then, no matter how much they liked you in the beginning, they’re sick of listening to you now. It’s like a bad marriage. In time, the players simply tune you out.
Second rule: You pretty much need to alternate between a players’ coach and a taskmaster, every single time. Think about how many times you hear this. If a good-guy coach gets fired, the players say: ‘We needed more leadership, more toughness, more direction.’ If a bad-guy coach gets fired, the players say: ‘We needed more understanding, better communication, more compassion.’
There was an immediate easing of tension under Charron. How that will translate into wins is another matter. In any case, he gets a 15-game trial.
As for Risebrough, much ink was spilled in Calgary on the question of whether he jumped or was pushed. In the end, does it really matter? The fact is, he made the right decision. Finally.
Now it’s up to the Flames’ players to do their bit in getting the team back on the right track. It’s just too bad that, in the aftermath of the Gilmour trade, the players who were in Calgary in March simply aren’t as good as the ones who were here in September.