Step two of the hiring process was to find the right person to replace John Ferguson Jr.  Apparently unable to locate a person with the right credentials on a permanent basis last spring, the club turned to Cliff Fletcher and asked him to act as steward of the club’s fortunes during the initial stages of the rebuilding process. In doing so, the Leafs successfully managed to put one foot in front of the other. (Again, yay!)  Fletcher has, it must be said, acquitted himself quite well since his appointment: he made a deal on draft day that got the Leafs into position to pick up Luke Schenn;  he signed Niklas Hagman and Jeff Finger; for every questionable acquisition (Ryan Hollweg), there has been a great pickup (I’m looking at you, Mikhail Grabovski); for every Jamal Mayers, a Mike Van Ryn. It is too early to say whether these players, and others (such as recently acquired Lee Stempniak ) constitute the necessary pieces of the puzzle, though it is unlikely that they form the core of a Cup winning team.  To get there, some of these assets will have to be moved elsewhere, and fresh talent added to the basic building blocks at a later date.  At this stage, as we’ve been told by team officials, it’s not about wins and losses:  it’s about changing a culture of entitlement that had settled over the dressing room – a debilitating malaise that somehow begun interfering with the players’ performance.  At step two, Cliff Fletcher earns the MLSE another passing grade.

So much for sticking a warm body in the chair to answer the phones for the short term.  What of step three, making the decision to hire the person who will be general manager of this team in the long term?   It would appear that the organization’s focus has been on Brian Burke in that regard for some time;  reports emerged yesterday that it’s essentially a done deal.

So what of Brian Burke?   Assuming the reports to be true, how did MLSE do at this final stage of the decision-making process?  It seems to me that the answer to that question is inextricably linked to one’s assessment of the other candidates that were available for the job.

The case for Burke, as ably put by Sean from Down Goes Brown, is basically as follows:

• Cliff Fletcher, although performing well in his current role as the interim GM, is not a viable option in the long term due to his age (I have observed elsewhere that Fletcher is so old, he once appeared on a game show where the grand prize was “fire”);
• Burke is the best candidate that is now available, and there is an urgency to get started on a long-term rebuilding plan;
• Burke’s strong personality and industry cachet will position him well to countermand the interfering tendencies of the non-hockey people who fill the boardrooms at MLSE.

Sean also points out that the oft-repeated knock against Burke – that his one Cup win came with a team built by Bryan Murray – ignores the fact that Burke did add some significant pieces (Pronger, Niedermayer, Beauchemin) to that team, reminding us that success always has many fathers.

Meanwhile, mf37 of Bitter Leaf Fan fame puts the case for the nays. That argument turns out to be more of a case for the “not quite yets.”  He points out that Burke is far from infallible, having had what the British education system calls a “deferred success” (something you and I would recognize as a “failure”) at the draft table in his years with both the Canucks and Ducks.  He also describes Burke’s struggles adapting to the salary cap constraints under which all NHL clubs now operate as follows:

Desperate for cap space, he also waived Ilya Bryzgalov (think about this: Wade Belak was worth more) and dealt Andy McDonald (who provided much needed second line scoring, disciplined play and 14 points in 21 playoff games during the Ducks’ run to the Cup) to St. Louis for Doug Weight, who was a healthy scratch in the playoffs. MacDonald outscored Weight in the regular season 2:1.

Clearly, cap management has not been Burke’s strong suit to the point that the franchise’s top prospect remains in the AHL awaiting Anaheim to clear the salary space so he can play with the big club.

He points out that there are other established hockey management professionals who will be available at the end of this season, including David Poile of the Predators, Darcy Regier of the Sabres, and Doug Wilson of the Sharks.  These other options suggest to the naysayers that it would be best for the Leafs not to act hastily;  to explore the possibility of hiring these others before hitching our wagon to Burke’s train.

Essentially mf37′s argument, though cogent,  is incomplete.  It basically amounts to an assertion that the Leafs ought to wait because something better than a Burke-o-Matic™ may soon be available.  What isn’t included in his argument, however, is any discussion of the relative merits of Burke’s supposed rivals for the job.

So let’s take a look:

• David Poile:  Currently the GM of the Nashville Predators, Poile has a contract that expires at the end of this season.  He gets consideration, so the theory goes, because he’s been able to put together a team that has had some regular season successes with resources that amount to a stinky equipment bag and some used shinpad tape.  This is true, so far as it goes.  One ought not to ignore, however, Poile’s previous fifteen years as GM of the Washington Capitals – a period in which the Caps won seven playoff rounds.   Adding in four first-round exits by the Preds in Poile’s ten years in Nashville (and six did-not-qualifys) leaves Poile with seven playoff rounds won in 25 years.   I’m not bashing the guy – neither Washington nor Nashville, in Poile’s time with these teams, provided him with the resources to really take a run at excellence – but doesn’t the case for Poile boil down to an assertion that he’s got 25 years’ experience keeping teams alive in non-traditional hockey markets with little or no money and less talent?   In sum, although Poile gets points for no doubt learning a little bit about efficiently deploying dollars to build towards success in an expansion/rebuilding environment, he loses points for failing to actually translate that knowledge into any playoff success to speak of.  He might be the ideal candidate for a job with the Panthers, but he doesn’t seem to fit the bill for the Leafs’ job.
• Darcy Regier: Currently the GM of the Buffalo Sabres, Regier’s contract is also up at the end of the year.  Another exec perenially hamstrung by low budgets, Regier’s Sabres missed a Stanley Cup in ’99 (his second year on the job) by the distance between Bill McCreary’s whistle and his mouth (on Brett Hull’s foot-in-the-crease winner).  In the grand scheme of things, Regier is probably entitled to take about as much credit for that run as Burke is for the Ducks’ Cup victory.  Since then, the Sabres (under Regier’s direction) have carved out a little niche for themselves at being the little team that could, frequently making spirited runs late into the post-season.  Regier, to his credit, has managed to find players that skate hard for one another and play an exciting team-first style of offence.  Somewhat troubling is the team’s history, on his watch, of getting into nasty and destabilizing negotiations with the team’s marquee players (see Peca, Michael, Hasek, Dominik and – to a certain degree – Vanek, Thomas who was almost lost to the Oilers on an offer sheet as a result of the Sabres’ refusal to negotiate contracts during the regular season).  Also troubling:  last year’s first to worst slide, following the departure of Chris Drury and Daniel Briere;  if resource issues were going to prevent the Sabres from re-signing these guys, Regier has to take some heat for either (a) not getting them the support they needed during the window of opportunity the Sabres had to win; or, in the alternative (b) realizing that the window wasn’t realistically open at all and disposing of those assets in a way that returned something to the Sabres for the future.  Regier seemed to me to hang on to goalie Martin Biron too long as well (having that talented a backup to Ryan Miller is a luxury the Sabres could not afford). More compelling:  although the Sabres’ draft record in the first round isn’t stellar over the last ten years , they have done an excellent job of stocking their own cupboards under Regier’s direction:  there are only six players who have played for the Sabres this year who were NOT drafted by the club.  Put him down as a maybe.
• Doug Wilson:  According to mf37, Wilson’s contract allows him to receive offers from other teams during the upcoming summer months.  Wilson is an intriguing possibility;  his Sharks have consistently performed well in the regular season (finishing first or second) but have failed to advance to the big dance, losing middle round playoff series, first to  Calgary (’04) and Edmonton (’06) (both of which were the eventual Conference Champions) and then (more recently) to good teams from Detroit (’07) and Dallas (’08).   Wilson gets huge points for totally hosing the Bruins and getting Joe Thornton for Marco Sturm, Wayne Primeau and Brad Stuart.  Wilson’s draft credentials also seem relatively solid:  a fair number of the Sharks’ current players were drafted either while he was serving as GM or during his tenure as Director of Player Development with the team.  The only question mark I can think of is last year’s acquisition of unrestricted free agent Brian Campbell at the deadline:   the Sharks gave up Steve Bernier and their first-round pick in the ’08 draft for Campbell and the Sabres’ seventh rounder.   The Sharks didn’t win the Cup and Campbell didn’t re-sign;  he’s currently playing his trade in Chicago.  From the “that would be awkward” file, Wilson is of course the GM who fired present Leaf coach Ron Wilson from his previous post as coach of the Sharks.  This last reason alone wouldn’t be a good reason not to hire DW.   It seems to me, though, that there is substantial doubt about whether he will actually be available at the end of the coming season.  To begin with, it’s unlikely he’ll be fired or not re-hired, given the Sharks’ success over the last few years.  The only way that seems possible at all is if the Sharks absolutely flame out, Ottawa-style, from this point on in the season and miss the playoffs entirely under first year coach Todd McLellan.  Wilson, having gone off the board and hired McLellan, a coach with no previous NHL experience, would be vulnerable in that disaster scenario because he could be said to have chosen to hire the wrong coach at a time when the Sharks’ window of opportunity to win has to be considered open wide.  As of this writing, however, the Sharks are 17-3-1 and in first place in their division.  They have scored the most goals (80) and allowed the second fewest (49) of any team.  It seems unlikely that they are headed for such a festival of fail, so Wiilson isn’t going to be forced out.  The Leafs would have to hope that they could simply drive a dump truck full of money up to Wilson’s doorstep and smile sweetly, contract in hand.   They would also have to hope that the dump truck full of money would be enough to convince Wilson to leave a spot where he seems to have a decent chance to win a Cup in the near future – a place close to his family (he has a daughter at school in Southern Cal) – for a fistful of money and a nightmare rebuilding project.  It might be different if Wilson had historical ties to the Leaf organization, but somehow I just don’t see it happening.

What of any other candidates?  One name that came to my mind is Washington Capitals GM George McPhee;  he’s been through a teardown/rebuild project once already in Washington, and with the help of a fellow by the name of Ovechkin, he seems to be moving in the right direction.  I don’t know anything at all about his contract status.  It struck me that McPhee has already been through some of the issues currently afflicting the Leafs, though not in anything like the media fishbowl that the Leafs operate within.   Of course the Caps haven’t won a lot of playoff series in the recent past, and they do compete in the perenially undercompetitive Southeast Division, so any success they’ve had has come a bit easier than, say, that of the Sharks (see above).  Another worry is the fact that he’d take the risks involved in the Alex Ovechkin deal, as James Mirtle has very capably pointed out.

Are there any other alternatives?  According to James Mirtle, the Leafs “tried” to talk to Ken Holland and Jim Rutherford too¹.  That sounds to me like their attempts were rebuffed;  in any event, I have to assume that if Holland were realistically available, he would have the job already.  How could he not?  As much as it pains me to say, the Red Wings have been a model organization since the late 80s;  their stick-boys are probably eminently qualified to teach a class on responsible hockey management.  As for Jim Rutherford, as much as the childhood Spitfire fan in me would love to give Jimmy a shot at running the show, as has been pointed out by Sean, the Leafs have already been down the road of one-shot wonders from Carolina (hmmm…Paul Maurice had a Spitfire connection too, come to think of it).

That’s it, I think, for proven hockey folk.  The only other option for the Leafs, it seems to me – and it’s a choice that I haven’t seen discussed very much, if at all – is to go off the board entirely and hire a proven general manager from another sport:  someone who has experience negotiating contracts and dealing with a salary cap and the marketing/promotional end of the business, but who would delegate hockey decisions to an underling.  That option likely isn’t politically very viable – there would be a real risk of a riot at 40 Bay, I’d say, if a non-hockey type took over the post – and ultimately begs the question anyway:  who’s going to make the hockey decisions?

Conclusion:

At the end of the day, then, the decision to hire Brian Burke comes down to this:  a judgement by MLSE that he is likely better than David Poile or Darcy Regier, two guys who may be available at the end of the year.  I would suggest that it says little about MLSE’s estimation of Doug Wilson or Ken Holland’s worth or suitability for the job, and much more about the practical reality that they are not candidates because they’re not available.   As stated above, I don’t find Poile’s credentials that compelling, with all due respect to the man.  Although Regier’s draft work in particular is interesting, I can’t say that MLSE is obviously wrong in making the choice that they have.

Those are the facts, folks.  It seems to me that – unless you disagree and feel that either Poile or Regier is a demonstrably superior choice, to the extent that would justify putting off the decision until after the trade deadline – then I think you’re forced to admit that this decision is the right one for the Toronto Maple Leafs.  There are no guarantees that Burke will bring a Stanley Cup to Toronto.  That doesn’t mean, though, that hiring him is the wrong decision.  In fact, it has to be seen as the right one, for now.

As an aside, I am hopeful as a fan of the team that Burke’s ego won’t prevent him from reaching out to fill out the hockey department at MLSE with some folks who can help him in those areas with which he has stuggled (cough the draft cough).  It’s probably not realistic to think that he could manage to lure someone like Regier to jump on board in a subordinate role, but – if I were in charge – no expense would be spared to hire away folks from the Sabres’ (and Sharks’ and Wings’) scouting and talent evaluation system.  In the new NHL, you can’t spend your way to success by putting more dollars into hockey players than the next guy, but you can spend more than him on all of the activities that help identify, select and train new talent (as well as on things designed to make the players you have in the organization healthier, more focussed and more productive).

—————–

¹ Mirtle says that the Leafs “tried” to talk to Doug Wilson too; I take this as supportive of my conclusions about Wilson’s likely unavailability.

PPP has sought some help answering a series of five questions directed his way by certain mischievous Oiler fans. Here are the five questions, with my proposed answers.

1. What is the consensus amongst Leaf fans about the Sundin situation?

Divided. Those who advocate staying the course worry that Sundin’s return would provide little benefit (as far as team success) and delay or derail entirely the development of young forwards gobbling up prime minutes in important situations. Those who don’t see the team obtaining a top five draft pick anyway want him back to teach the youngsters the way. Those who are cannibals think he looks delicious.

2. What is the worst deal in the past 5 years that the Leafs have done? What has been the best?

The worst on-ice deal has to be Red Light Raycroft. Colorado Avalanche fans (both of them) are by now learning that with “Razor” (cough) in net, the “scoring area” now includes all four corners of the rink, most washrooms on the mezzanine level of the arena, and a substantial portion of the state of Colorado. There are no guarantees that Tuuka Rask (who the Leafs traded to get Raycrap) will ever be Martin Brodeur v. 2.0, but that deal perfectly symbolizes the ineptness of the JFJ management regime: JFJ evidently failed to foresee that Ed Belfour would age, because he failed to have a suitable successor ready to take over from within the organization; he then badly overpaid for Raycrap (both by way of trade and by way of mammoth contract), a goalie whose “talent” he over-estimated; to fix his own mistakes in that regard, the Leafs were then required to trade for Vesa Toskala. The best deal may well be Cliff’s most recent Risebrough: a 2nd-rounder for Mikhail Grabovski.

3. How does it feel knowing that the last Stanley Cup that the Leafs won was when there were 6 teams in the league?

How did it feel when Chris Pronger and his wife basically hocked a loogie on the statue of Gretz out front of the Rexall Place/Skyreach Centre/Edmonton Coliseum/Northlands Coliseum? How did it feel when Roli the Goalie got steamrollered in Game 1 of the ‘06 Final, following which the Oil coughed up a three-goal lead and went on to lose the series in 7 games? That’s gotta hurt. Anyway, take those feelings, transplant them on a fan base that actually keeps coming to the games when the team doesn’t have a freakish run of success, and you get the idea. Laugh it up out there, Oiler fans – at least our team never lost the Cup to a bunch of itinerant hillbillies.

4. Rumor has it that Cliff Fletcher is 612 years old. Is this a concern for Leafs fans?

It is true that Cliff Fletcher is so old, he was once a contestant on a game show where the big prize was “fire”. Nevertheless, the front office is one place where the “wily veteran with a track record of success” is much preferred over the “promising but unproven talent”: see the entry in Failopedia for “Ferguson, John Jr.”. By the way, hope that Steve Tambellini thing works out for you guys. Really.

5. Do you hold out hope for Brian Burke coming to town?

I personally want Brian Burke to come town about as much as Kevin Lowe would like to carpool with the guy. Burke’s record – both as it relates to the draft and his ability to assemble a well-rounded team (or even one NHL calibre starting goalie) is doubtful, as I’m sure the seven time Stanley Cup Champion Vancouver Canucks would agree. His record with the Ducks raises questions about his ability to manage the cap, though Niedermayer and Selanne have to bear some of the blame for that. It would, however, be fun to watch Burkie berate the local mittenstringers like a drill sergeant with PMS on a daily basis. Put me down for “meh.”

“The message is simple,” says the interim general manager. “The team is going to get better.

“It’s going to be a team starting next October that the fans are going to get excited about and be able to become proud about again.”

HiR:tb sources deep inside Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment confirm that the “there, there, it will get better in time” theme underlying Fletcher’s remarks to the media was selected after several board meetings characterized by boisterous debate between opposing management camps; in the end, the board decided this approach would be superior to the “don’t worry, the 2007-2008 Maple Leafs went to live on a farm” message that reportedly tested very well in focus-groups composed largely of six-year olds, hardcore Tie Domi fans from Woodbridge, and CBC budget planning executives.

In the “No Shit Sherlock” Department, please note that Fletcher isn’t saying that the turnaround will come quickly:

“Back when I was in Calgary and we looked up the road at the Edmonton Oilers . . . I had lunch with a rancher one day,” Fletcher recalled. “I said, ‘Boy, we’ve got to straighten this thing out in a hurry.’

“He said, ‘Cliff, the corral is full of horses but you can only bring one into the barn at a time.’

Couched as it is in folksy wisdom terms involving things like barns, horses and corrals, this observation must indisputably be both pithy and truthful. As compelling as all agricultural reasoning may be, however, I think that it would have been better for Uncle Cliff to quote Robert Duvall’s character (Officer Bob Hodges) from the film Colors, which would have had the obvious advantage of referring to bulls and fornication instead of barns and horses (which are, no doubt, a rather “girly” animal). Perhaps it’s just a matter of personal preference, but I think that this reference, delivered with the appropriate amount of non-Michael Jackson-like crotch grabbing would have a salutary effect upon Fletcher’s overall machismo and might well intimidate other general managers and scare them into making a stupid trade with the Leafs, such as Andrew Raycroft for – well, anybody.

The real news in this article, however, concerns neither the public grieving for a stillborn season, nor the relative merits of colourful rural parables. Rather, the incredible news in this item concerns the nature of an NHL general manager’s job duties: to run a team based upon the received wisdom of sandwich-gobbling cowboys. All these years, I thought that general managers were executives who functioned much like management in other business organizations: setting goals, objectives and priorities, evaluating personnel, devoting scarce institutional resources towards certain needs and doing things like, well, managing (generally) their organization’s attempts to achieve an objective. I guess I just sort of assumed that the decisions the manager made would be based upon his own assessment of the correct organizational response to the particular challenges faced at any given point in time. It would appear, however, that the evidence runs much to the contrary: if the Calgarian renaissance in question was indeed sparked by an aphorism-spouting farmer, the key to success does not come from within, but is instead received as a fait accompli from without.

One thing is, accordingly,unmistakably clear: Cliff Fletcher needs to start eating a shitload of lunch with so many homesteaders as are prepared to provide their accumulated wisdom, so that Fletcher may glean the answers to the pressing concerns of the day. Speaking as an interested Leaf supporter, I would be in favour of Mr. Fletcher replacing both his breakfast and his dinner with lunches, as it seems to me that there are plenty of hockey-related problems to solve and precious few meals in a day; it would be better, in my estimation, if he didn’t fill up on things like cereal and steaks, which are unlikely to be accompanied by any helpful advice whatsoever. I know that Mr. Fletcher is getting on in years and that he can’t commit his entire life to the rebuilding project, but I wonder whether he would also be prepared to squeeze in a couple of extra lunches a week, perhaps in the afternoon when the rest of the guys in the office have gone out for coffee. If it would help, maybe MLSE could spring for a treadmill to put in Cliff’s office so that he’s not in danger of getting so much guidance that his pants start to split.

Obviously, Leaf management can’t be out to lunch all the time (though folks like Damien Cox will suggest the contrary) , so it occurred to me that in the interests of pushing the boundaries of managerial excellence, it might be possible to augment the lunchtime policy symposiums with the undoubtedly excellent counsel offered in a number of other places in which the rich ore of hockey wisdom has yet to be mined by rival general managers (rather like the Leafs’ decision to draft Luca Cereda from that secret hotbed of hockey, Switzerland – and you know how well that worked out). Accordingly, I’ve compiled a list below of other places (besides lunch with didactic agriculturalists) in which it might be possible for the Leaf brass to obtain the insight necessary to right the ship and win a Cup:

• The barber shop. Hey, you gotta look good if you’re going to be eating all that lunch, so why not go for a trim and – while you’re there – learn who to hire to run the power play and why it is important to employ a sufficient number of aggressive cretins to ensure success on the ice. Saturday afternoons are good, I think – listen carefully whenever anyone begins a statement by opining loudly “In my day…” or speaks wistfully about an incident like the time Dan Maloney tried to see what was inside Brian Glennie’s head by smashing it on the ice – these are “real hockey fans” speaking.
• Any bar, or indeed any establishment that serves alcohol in the Dominion of Canada. Note that the most excellent intelligence is likeliest to be offered up after the patrons inside have each had a few bowls of loudmouth soup. Tip: ask around for someone who doesn’t watch any televised hockey and doesn’t attend any games in person; in my personal experience, these guys have by far the most expert advice to offer.
• Ann Landers. (’nuff said).
• Newspaper columnists. Many sports columnists have several opinions about the correct course of action for the franchise to pursue.
• The blogosphere. Um, I’m just going to shuffle my feet for a bit, stare at the floor, then clear my throat for a while to break up the awkward silence.

Feel free to drop me a line in the comments section if you can think of other places in which Leafs managment might get a little free education about the task ahead.
Full text of the Globe article here, go clicky…