Quote:
Originally Posted by FlameZilla
I love all this bollox about players who 'hate to lose'. Everybody 'hates to lose'.
It's very easy to assemble a team of players who hate to lose. Making those loss-hating individuals perform as a collective winning team is entirely different.
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Anyone who has been a fan and student of the Flames Flames knows there is a lot of evidence to counter this belief. There are plenty of players who don't mind losing and will acknowledge it (losing) is part of the game; there's nothing to get upset about. These are the guys who will repeat the same tired cliches and not invest themselves in the game or in the team in ways that matter. These are the guys that continue to believe that nothing is broken and that another five or ten games will turn things around. Many of these guys have been fan favorites which has prevented the team from making the appropriate moves to rid the organization of these cancers.
Historically when the Flames came from Atlanta they were filled with guys who didn't hate the "hate to lose" attitude. Eric Chouinard, Eric Vail, Willie Plett, Ken Houston and Kent Nilsson were all pretty young guys, but they had the loser mentality. They learned their game from guys on the downside of their careers who never amounted to anything. All of these guys had carefree attitudes about the game and it showed on and off the ice. Cliff Fletcher recognized this and actively looked for players to change the team attitude by trading for guys that had winning experience and hated to lose. This is why Fletcher brought in Mel Bridgeman, Lanny McDonald, Doug Risebrough and John Tonelli. These guys hated to lose and they instilled that attitude in every young player that came into the room after that. Additions of Brad McCrimmon and Doug Gilmour, both very vocal leaders, only furthered that for the team as they marched towards the cup.
Sadly, when Fletcher moved on this important facet of player selection and development was lost on the team. Guys that hated to lose as a team, like Doug Gilmour, Joe Nieuwendyk and Gary Roberts, were cast aside for players like Theoron Fleury who were more concerned about personal success than they were about the team. This negatively impacted a generation of players and only began to change after Darryl Sutter was hired by the organization.
Sutter hated the mix on the hockey club and, until he was sacked, Craig Button began to make changes to improve the attitude and leadership on the team. In came Shean Donovan, Andrew Ference, Ville Nieminen, and Chris Simon. None of these guys were great hockey players, but they hated to lose and they would do anything for the team to win. When these foot soldiers play hard and sacrifice it shames the stars into doing the same. This type of play becomes contagious and why coaches love their role players so much.
This is why everyone associated with the team has come in and stated the solutions to the problems are in the room. The leadership has supposedly been there, but refused to surface and take the team in the direction they needed to go. The only way to move this team forward was to remove that leadership piece by piece and try to have the leadership step up and change the attitude to that of win at all cost and hate it when they lose. Dion Phaneuf and Robyn Regehr were both sent packing so the only core leader left in the room was Jarome Iginla. The same problems continued leaving only one guy as the leadership challenge. We know how that played out.
Going forward the Flames face a challenge of injecting new leadership into the dressing room. They need to find some veteran presence that will show some true leadership and instill a feeling of team and a hatred of losing. I do not believe that player is in the dressing room and I feel that it will take a couple of players to really affect change. I think the Flames need to go out and find a veteran leader up front and on the blue line who hate to lose and will leave it all out on the ice every game. As much as I like Giordano he isn't a leader and he has the stench of the problems from the past five years all over him. They need someone to come in and lead on and off the ice. An Adam Burish or a Troy Brower and an Andrew Ference or a Deryk Engelland would be a start. A player from a winning organization who has worn a letter would be better. But the Flames are in a situation where they need effective leadership immediately so they don't waste the quality youngsters coming into the pipeline. The loser mentality is contagious and the Flames need to make sure that it does not spread through the team to the new players. The Flames need to find their Doug Risebrough and John Tonelli to make the next generation of Flames players that much better.