2013 Hall of Fame class

[tempz]

Originally Posted by Badger Bob

People are afraid of saying this, but it's true. The precedent was set when Roger Neilson was inducted. A lot of this was because the terminal illness and the fact that he'd coached in Toronto. Otherwise, his name isn't up there with Toe Blake, Punch Imlach, Scotty Bowman, Al Arbour or even Glen Sather.

Burns's accomplishments are 1 Prince of Wales championship (lost to Flames in the Finals!), one Stanley Cup, 3 Jack Adams trophies with lifetime record of 501-353.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/coaches/burnspa99c.html

He is not in the top 10 for any of the major categories of games coached, wins, losses (yep, coach several years and you're going to lose a lot games) and titles.

To benchmark:

Iron Mike had 2 Prince of Wales championships, a Clarence Campbell championship, one Stanley Cup, 1 Jack Adams trophy with a lifetime record of 672-531.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/coaches/keenami99c.html

Both men were known as abrasive, and their styles tended to soon wear thin. Burns had a better Win % during the regular season with .573 vs. .551 for Keenan. Keenan had a better Win % in the playoffs with .555 vs. .523 for Burns. Seems like a fair comparison.

So, is anybody here going to discuss a future HHOF induction for Mike Keenan?

One last thing about Pat Burns, many years ago, while Toronto radio station CHUM-FM Toronto was on my car stereo a report came on with their sports guy, Rick Hodge. He indicated that there were veteran players who were "tuning out" Burns. If you had to peg me for the names, they'd begin with Andreychuk and Gilmour. Wouldn't it stand to reason that a Hall of Fame coach would be able to get his message through to the main on-ice leaders?

I always kind of figured the 3 x Jack Adams would be enough. IIRC no other coach has done that. That being said I'm not in the category of people who think its a travesty each year he doesn't get in. I feel like he'll likely get in 15-20 years from now.

[Badger Bob]

Originally Posted by tempz

I always kind of figured the 3 x Jack Adams would be enough. IIRC no other coach has done that. That being said I'm not in the category of people who think its a travesty each year he doesn't get in. I feel like he'll likely get in 15-20 years from now.

Fair point of discussion.

Let's look at the winners:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/adams.html

Big names, who won it twice include Scotty Bowman, Jacques Demers, Jacques Lemaire and Pat Quinn. HOFers Al Arbour, Fred Shero and Glen Sather only won it once each. Among active coaches, Joel Quenneville only won it when he coached in St. Louis! Yeah, it's understood that the voting is completed before the post-season, but the man's won 2 Cups since. He must be doing something right in Chicago.

We can figure where Pat Burns fits in the grand scheme. It is interesting that nobody's won it twice since the last time Burns won it.

Edit: for argument's sake, a little research was required on the trophy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Adams_Award

The winner is selected by a poll of the National Hockey League Broadcasters Association at the end of the regular season.

Although it is impressive to have won the award 3x, how meaningful is the award, itself? Are broadcasters really the most qualified to judge how good of a job a coach does? Many of these broadcasters would have seen little of the teams in the other conference. (Results are skewed toward the East.) Maybe there's no better way to guage. My first thought was to poll the coaches, themselves. Then, how to account for coaching changes during the season?

[tempz]

Originally Posted by Badger Bob

Fair point of discussion.

Let's look at the winners:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/adams.html

Big names, who won it twice include Scotty Bowman, Jacques Demers, Jacques Lemaire and Pat Quinn. HOFers Al Arbour, Fred Shero and Glen Sather only won it once each. Among active coaches, Joel Quenneville only won it when he coached in St. Louis! Yeah, it's understood that the voting is completed before the post-season, but the man's won 2 Cups since. He must be doing something right in Chicago.

We can figure where Pat Burns fits in the grand scheme. It is interesting that nobody's won it twice since the last time Burns won it.

Edit: for argument's sake, a little research was required on the trophy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Adams_Award



Although it is impressive to have won the award 3x, how meaningful is the award, itself? Are broadcasters really the most qualified to judge how good of a job a coach does? Many of these broadcasters would have seen little of the teams in the other conference. (Results are skewed toward the East.) Maybe there's no better way to guage. My first thought was to poll the coaches, themselves. Then, how to account for coaching changes during the season?

You make really good points here. Scotty Bowman only won it twice but he made the playoffs 28 times and won 9 Stanley Cups. I don't think anyone would ever assume for a second that Burns is a better coach than Bowman because he won the Jack Adams one more time. Out of all the trophies given out it definitely seems to be the one most open to interpretation. If you look at Wikipedia it shows that only four times has the Jack Adams winner coached the team that went on to win the Stanley Cup that season. That seems insanely low.

[Badger Bob]

Originally Posted by tempz

You make really good points here. Scotty Bowman only won it twice but he made the playoffs 28 times and won 9 Stanley Cups. I don't think anyone would ever assume for a second that Burns is a better coach than Bowman because he won the Jack Adams one more time. Out of all the trophies given out it definitely seems to be the one most open to interpretation. If you look at Wikipedia it shows that only four times has the Jack Adams winner coached the team that went on to win the Stanley Cup that season. That seems insanely low.

Relationships with Scotty Bowman are kind of different in the Buffalo region, where I reside. He still lives here. The only time he was GM was with the Sabres. He started with the team, right after they made the conference finals, and left with the first overall pick in the '87 draft (Turgeon). You know what a record like that leads to.

It made me think that, in some ways, he was an opportunist. Although this is true, it's hardly the whole story. With St. Louis, he was coaching the Blues in a conference of expansion teams with little serious chance of capturing the Cup. Somebody in Montreal must've been impressed enough with his work to put himself in the position to get the Canadiens job, besides being originally from the area. That record speaks for itself.

Then, he got the Sabres job. This is essentially the only black mark on his record. His next chance to shine was in Pittsburgh, after our old pal, Badger Bob, passed. Coaching Lemieux & Jagr at their best wasn't such a bad gig. Then, of course, it was off to Detroit, when the Red Wings were getting on the verge.

It's easy for any of us to say, "well, look at the talent that he had in Montreal, Pittsburgh and Detroit!" Well, yeah, but he had to handle the egos in Montreal, get some one dimensional goal scorers to pay attention to the defensive aspects of the game (looking at Steve Yzerman) and keep all of those teams focused on the main goal.

I did meet him once, and he's just like when you see him on TV. Ask a question, he pauses, looks up and gives a thoughtful reply. Really impressive man to be around. It was only for 5 minutes at a car show. Wish it could've been longer, like an hour, just to pick his brain about hockey. He did give me a nice momento: he autographed his Detroit Red Wings business card.

A couple of great stories about him:

In the late 70's the Rangers were playing the Canadiens. Phil Esposito was frustrated at being shadowed by Doug Jarvis. He couldn't contain his frustration. He shot a dirty look over at Scotty, while on the bench. Scotty said, "All night, Phil. All ****ing night."

The other was a little more recently. Luc Robataille described his initial experience with the Red Wings at their camp in Traverse City. He had a relatively minor injury. After workouts, he saw Scotty in the hall. Scotty asked him how he was feeling. He said not too bad. Scotty told him that they were there to win the last game in June. They did.

[tempz]

Originally Posted by Badger Bob

Relationships with Scotty Bowman are kind of different in the Buffalo region, where I reside. He still lives here. The only time he was GM was with the Sabres. He started with the team, right after they made the conference finals, and left with the first overall pick in the '87 draft (Turgeon). You know what a record like that leads to.

It made me think that, in some ways, he was an opportunist. Although this is true, it's hardly the whole story. With St. Louis, he was coaching the Blues in a conference of expansion teams with little serious chance of capturing the Cup. Somebody in Montreal must've been impressed enough with his work to put himself in the position to get the Canadiens job, besides being originally from the area. That record speaks for itself.

Then, he got the Sabres job. This is essentially the only black mark on his record. His next chance to shine was in Pittsburgh, after our old pal, Badger Bob, passed. Coaching Lemieux & Jagr at their best wasn't such a bad gig. Then, of course, it was off to Detroit, when the Red Wings were getting on the verge.

It's easy for any of us to say, "well, look at the talent that he had in Montreal, Pittsburgh and Detroit!" Well, yeah, but he had to handle the egos in Montreal, get some one dimensional goal scorers to pay attention to the defensive aspects of the game (looking at Steve Yzerman) and keep all of those teams focused on the main goal.

I did meet him once, and he's just like when you see him on TV. Ask a question, he pauses, looks up and gives a thoughtful reply. Really impressive man to be around. It was only for 5 minutes at a car show. Wish it could've been longer, like an hour, just to pick his brain about hockey. He did give me a nice momento: he autographed his Detroit Red Wings business card.

A couple of great stories about him:

In the late 70's the Rangers were playing the Canadiens. Phil Esposito was frustrated at being shadowed by Doug Jarvis. He couldn't contain his frustration. He shot a dirty look over at Scotty, while on the bench. Scotty said, "All night, Phil. All ****ing night."

The other was a little more recently. Luc Robataille described his initial experience with the Red Wings at their camp in Traverse City. He had a relatively minor injury. After workouts, he saw Scotty in the hall. Scotty asked him how he was feeling. He said not too bad. Scotty told him that they were there to win the last game in June. They did.

Thanks for sharing this. I have a distant personal connection to Bowman. My grandfather played football with him for multiple seasons on the Montreal Junior Alouettes back in the 50s and they were co-captains. There is a picture on the wall of my grandparents basement of that team and it is pretty cool to look at. They fell out of touch and haven't spoken since Bowman has been famous but my grandfather speaks very highly of him.