Can Doug Gilmour bring the intensity and hockey savvy he displayed in his stellar NHL career to his new job in Kingston?
KINGSTON - I saw something Wednesday that I haven't seen before at a junior team practice: a team wearing game sweaters.
To be expected, I guess. The coach had barely been introduced to his players. If he didn't have their names and numbers, he would have no way of knowing who's who.
The hiring of a coach who doesn't have a working knowledge of his players - of the league, for that matter - is not every-day stuff, especially in mid-season. But then again, bringing in the best player in your town's modern history isn't every-day stuff either. So it goes with the Kingston Frontenacs signing up Doug Gilmour.
"I don't know their names, never mind what they can do," Gilmour said, lacing up his skates for his second practice with the club. "The learning curve is going to be really steep - for me, that is."
When it was announced that Gilmour was resigning his position as an assistant with the Toronto Marlies to take a coaching job with the Frontenacs, those obsessed with the Leafs landing Brian Burke and other less-stressed hockey fans tried to read the tea leaves. It was widely presumed that Gilmour was getting out of Dodge before the new sheriff moved into MLSE's corner office; that he was going to walk away before the trap door opened under him.
Not the case, Gilmour says.
"I've known Brian Burke since 1984," he said. "The easy thing would have been to finish the season with the Marlies. I'm doing the hard thing here."
Media wiseguys were suggesting that Gilmour was looking for a soft landing spot in Kingston.
Hardly.
It's a promotion; the new job is a heck of a lot harder than the previous one. He knows going in he'll have a lot more responsibility for prep work. He knows he'll face more pressure during games and, for that matter, wherever he goes in town. In Toronto he was always and will forever be No. 93, not the Marlies' assistant, player-development guy, goodwill ambassador or anything like that. In Kingston people will ask him about the team, especially with the team in a new building. The franchise has yet to win a round of the playoffs in this millennium. Kingston has missed the playoffs completely three times and effectively one other (a loss to North Bay in a one-game playoff for the eighth-seed in 2002). Wherever he goes it will be: "What's up with the Fronts?"
"Come back to your hometown and save the team," Gilmour says. "Some pressure-cooker."
And Gilmour's taking the job at some personal cost. His sons, ages 12 and 10, will remain in Toronto and he'll see them every chance he can - general manager Larry Mavety, who resigned the coach's job to bring Gilmour in, has given him some mid-week "flex days," allowing him day trips back to T.O. for quality time.
"I only signed on for the year because I want to see how my sons do with it," Gilmour says.
Two questions: 1. Will it work out? 2. Can he coach?
These are not two ways to ask the same question.
No. 1: It's uphill for the franchise. Dead last in the Eastern Conference, five wins in 23 games. There's no spinning that.
As bleak as the numbers are, there's still hope - Barrie holds the last playoff spot with 20 points in 23 games and four other teams are four points or less ahead of the Colts.
His hiring seems to have lit a fire under players whose confidence couldn't have been lower.
"The first practice I had to tell the kids, 'It's a practice, not a game,'" Gilmour says. "They were slamming each other into the boards, doing whatever they can to get noticed."
"It did really change things," defenceman Taylor Doherty says. "The energy was different from one day to the next."
Whether that energy translates into points can't be determined yet. Gilmour's hiring might make the Frontenacs a better team and they could still miss the playoffs.
No. 2: The more interesting question goes to Gilmour's ability to coach.
I'm sure he can. And I'm sure that he wants to.
I saw Doug Gilmour on a daily basis when I covered the Leafs in the mid-90s and picked up his trail in his other NHL stops. Back then - yes, kids, this goes back to the pre-internet days - there wasn't quite the puckerazzi media horde crowding the stars, especially the Leafs. A reporter could actually have a conversation with a player. Imagine.
Doug Gilmour always struck me as a guy who loved being at the rink. It was his element. He understood nuances in the game. He had his read on everyone in the Leafs room, not just the players but also the coaches, the trainers, the reporters, the security guard working the door to the dressing room and anyone else you'd care to name. If you walked into the Leafs room, you knew within a minute that his stall was the emotional and social centre of the room. He didn't run the team when Pat Burns was there, but I always had a sense that Pat Burns ran the team through him. And I always believed that Gilmour knew exactly what was going on. If this were Parliament Hill it would be labelled political savvy. In this situation you can just call it street smarts.
Gilmour can work a room: a roomful of teenagers; the living room of the parents of a kid drafted by the Frontenacs; a boardroom lined with sponsors. Whatever. The last couple are about as important as the dressing room.
Don't underestimate Gilmour's people skills. Years back, at the height of his Toronto celebrity, Gilmour was recruited to play a role in an episode of Kung Fu. (If ever there was a corny title, it has to be this one.) The role, as you can see from the credits, was no stretch. But a friend who worked on the show told me that he was impressed by the way Gilmour handled himself on the set - that, in fact, he hit his marks and gave professional quality stuff on the first take. It's a lot harder than it sounds. Just for a second imagine some other hockey stars in similar situations. (Alas, nothing of 99 on Wayne's World but, your Honour, I'd like to submit this into evidence.)
Gilmour was almost jumping out of his skin at the Fronts practice the other day. Sounds strange, but he might have been even more energized than his players.
Gilmour will be trying to establish himself in that thin minority - ex-NHL stars who have the ability to coach and the desire to do it.
It would surprise some fans to learn that some NHL players would be utterly useless as coaches - in fact, some guys you wouldn't let drive the team bus, never mind run the team. A lot of intelligent players aren't inclined to coach after their careers wind down - they can't get away from the rink fast enough and you can't blame them for wanting to move on. Others might give it a shot after a period of decompression, realizing that it's what they know best. A few have some skills and desire that give them a chance to succeed as coaches at some level and they'll give it a try. But woe is the ex-player, even a guy with career credentials, a solid reputation and a good hockey mind, if he doesn't have a successful run in his first shot at coaching. He'll get lumped in with the no-hopers. The cred that he earned as a player disappears that quickly - it's mostly a one-strike system.
Gilmour knows all this going in. If he can turn around the Frontenacs it will be no small accomplishment.
He got a taste of coaching in his assistant's job with the Marlies and wanted more. He was offered the job with the Frontenacs during the summer and didn't take it. He couldn't have been sure how much he really wanted. He found out enough in his short stint with the Marlies to know he wanted more.
Some called his hiring a publicity stunt. That insults him. And underestimates him. If his players are fired up by his skating out to practise with them, he should be just as fired up by those who doubt him.
BELLEVILLE - I took in Niagara playing a roadie vs. the Bulls Wednesday. Not the best way to see Alex Pietrangelo, the Ice Dogs defenceman who was St Louis' first-rounder, the No. 4 pick overall, in last June's NHL draft. Belleville ran away and hid in the third period of an 8-1 final. That said, when Pietrangelo crashed the goal to beat Bulls netminder Mike Murphy late in the second period, the Dogs trailed 3-1 and it looked like it was going to be a tight third period. A killer Belleville power play closed it out. You can't put any of the blame on Pietrangelo. He looks more dynamic on his return to the OHL from a stint with the St Louis Blues. He put in 30 minutes and broke even on the plus/minus. He tried to force the issue in the second period; he created and almost finished a scoring chance right before his goal, made nice 100-foot passes into the neutral zone look easy and basically played a man's game in a league of boys. I've written about the wisdom (the lack of it that is) in fast-tracking 18-year-olds to the NHL. It's going to be an interesting test case; I suspect that Pietrangelo will come out of this season better prepped for NHL success than Zach Bogosian in Atlanta and Luke Schenn with the Leafs. I'm sure that he has a better chance of coming out of it in one piece.
I spoke to Pietrangelo after the Belleville game and, yeah, he wasn't too chatty. That said he did his level best about making the best of his situation; with Niagara during the season, almost certainly with the Canadian team at the under-20s. The Russian touring team's tilt vs. the O stars on Monday night in Niagara will be a great chance to showcase his game. Pietrangelo at this stage reminds me a lot of Marc Staal a couple of years back and I'll be surprised if he isn't the dominant defenceman in the CHL this season. Pietrangelo didn't balk when I mentioned Staal's name. He saw a lot of Staal in the first round of the OHL playoffs in '07 when Sudbury squeezed out the then-Mississauga Ice Dogs. He could be even better than that. Marc Staal never skated as well as AP.
ENDNOTES: The talk around the O will be dominated by rumbles about trading John Tavares out of Oshawa, as reported by Mike Brophy for sportsnet.ca. I have to believe that London will make a hard play for him and I can't see Windsor busting up a straight to draw to a flush ... I've written a bit about the Brampton Battalion lately. Just want to assure people that rumours of Stan Butler’s death have been wildly mis-interpreted. That said, the coach's life on the buses has lasted a lot longer than Reg Varney’s series.
