Last week was an interesting yet boring one in the land of the Edmonton Oilers. We sat through 3 excruciating press conferences which provided very little new information other than “still evaluating” and the promise of unveiling “a plan”.
Let’s take a look at things…
In 2016-17 the heavily favoured Chicago Blackhawks lost to the Nashville Predators in the first round of the NHL playoffs. Pekka Rinne shutout the Hawks twice in a row en route to a 4-0 sweep. Questions were asked. Are the Hawks done? What can they do to change this and get back to Cup contenders who can go deep in the playoffs?
They did a few things. The Panarin trade was a disaster and made the Columbus Blue Jackets a serious threat in the east. Another thing they did (and what I’ll focus on) was fire assistant coach Mike Kitchen. Kitchen had worked with head coach Joel Quenneville for about 10 years total. From 1998-2003 with St. Louis (Pronger and MacInnis years), and from 2012-2017 with the Blackhawks. Reportedly Quenneville was PISSED that they fired his top assistant coach and good friend. Kitchen primarily coached the defence and helped on the penalty kill. The Hawks proceeded to have their worst season in over 10 years and missed the playoffs by nearly 20 points.
Now how does this relate to our Oilers? This organization is a mess, and a lot of what will follow is a reflection of said mess.
Last Thursday night, TSN 1260 host Dean Millard broke some “news?” that a “former NHL executive” direct messaged him on twitter saying that Oilers head coach Todd McLellan is staying but was told he has to fire one assistant coach and Todd said Jim Johnson would be the one to go.
Received a DM from a former NHL executive today who told me McLellan has already made his choice and the guy who runs the PK is the sacrificial lamb, so that would be Jim Johnson. We'll have to wait and see. We'll chat about this tonight on #SportsNight on @TSN1260 #Oilers.
— Dean Millard (@DuckMillard) April 13, 2018
This information is sketchy at best, personally, I don’t buy it, but its worth an analysis. It really does make sense in a way, though. If McLellan was given such an ultimatum, would he choose close confidante and friend Jay Woodcroft (who he’s been working with since 2005), or Johnson who was brought in by Doug Wilson to San Jose (along with NHL Hall of Famer Larry Robinson) in 2012?
Jim Johnson was a tough as nails stay-at-home defenceman when he played in the NHL. Notably for the Pittsburgh Penguins. Unfortunately, he was traded to the Minnesota North Stars the same year the Penguins beat the Stars to win their first Stanley Cup. Johnson’s coaching career started with stints under Rick Tocchet in Tampa Bay and Bruce Boudreau in Washington before being hired by San Jose in 2012.
When McLellan was hired by the Oilers he brought both assistants from his time in San Jose. The special teams there often struggled, especially in the last year when they missed the playoffs and all three were fired. Things weren’t much better here in 2015-16, but in 2016-17 the Oilers had a great powerplay at about 22% and a slightly below average penalty kill. But also in 2016-17, some great strides were made with our overall defensive play. Matt Benning became a name. Eric Gryba could shut things down sometimes. It just worked.
2017-18 was a different story. While Darnell Nurse took a huge step forward, Oscar Klefbom took a few steps backward. The penalty kill was historically bad. The question is can we pin this on one guy? Is Jim Johnson the scapegoat?
It’s important to remember the NHL isn’t the NFL. There’s 23 man rosters, not 53. There’s no such thing as an offensive coordinator or a defensive coordinator. The head coach controls the systems. The assistants assist. However, often times the “defence coach” will for all intents and purposes have major coaching control over defencemen and even (for some teams) choose matchups and send out defence pairings from the bench. (Not sure if Johnson does/did this with the Oilers).
McLellan appears to have a lot of power at this point in time. The fact he wasn’t fired after game 82 (or even during the season as some thought he should including yours truly), means he’s most likely staying as Oilers head coach for the beginning of the 2018-19 NHL season.
But… Will he get to choose his assistants? Someone needs to be fired for this disaster of a season. Jay Woodcroft and the 31st ranked NHL powerplay will be back, he’s been attached with super glue to McLellan since 2005. But what would happen with Jim Johnson and who would replace him? I mean who in the Oilers organization would be a good candidate to coach the Oilers young defenceman? It’s not like there’s a Hall of Famer top all-time NHL defenceman recently hired by the Oilers is there?…
BAH GAWD!!! IS THAT??.. IT IS!!!… THAT’S PAUL COFFEY’S MUSIC!!!!
All kidding aside, that most likely wouldn’t be McLellan’s choice as defensive assistant coach. And as much as I love Paul Coffey (one of my top 3 favourite all-time players), I don’t want anything forced upon McLellan if he stays on here. The Oilers are the definition of organizational dysfunction, and the last thing we need is it to be directly behind the bench (although we have it already, but I digress).
Is McLellan really willing or able to find the best and brightest to be an assistant coach at the most important position? One that might have a different vision and philosophy as he does? One that could possibly take over as head coach if we get off to another slow start next year? One that could take his job and get the team in a better direction, thus making him look more incompetent that he looks now? Yeah, I doubt it…
If we’re going to keep McLellan, we might as well keep the other underachievers too. There’s no assistant knight in shining armor to save the day. If Todd is the coach then it’s his team and his assistants. No more dysfunction, please. It’s brutal. Learn from Chicago.
It should be simple: Either fire the mall or keep the mall.
Plan A: Fire all of them (makes way too much sense)
Plan B: Fire an assistant coach (creates more problems)
Plan C: Stay the course (nobody wants it, but it’s better than plan B)
The Dirtbag
