The trials and tribulations of Glen Gulutzan

[Kybb79]

Do we have one of the worst coaching staffs in the NHL?I think so.Look at the team we have they look lazy and out of position at times.Under Hartley they had a reputation of being the hardest working team around.Good coaches know how to push the players buttons.My main concern is GG's handling of Bennett,I think he has ruined him to the point he might be a bust.Yeah they might win enough games then get outcoached again in the first round and lose.A good coach can adjust during the game or before depending on the oppositions style.Mainly the Oilers GG looks like the only coach that has no clue how to shut down Mcdavid.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by Frank MetaMusil

Brian Sutter won an Adams. I know that means next to nothing here, but I'd put GG ahead of Brent based on the fact he actually made the playoffs.

2011 Brent had 94 points with 11 OT/SOL.

You could have a Calgary Sun Rookie Reporter behind the bench for OT games and this current roster wouldn't lose 11 OT Games.

[JFK]

Originally Posted by Strange Brew

GG has to win a playoff game before I would be prepared to put him ahead of anybody on the Sutter scale.

Originally Posted by Frank MetaMusil

Brian Sutter won an Adams. I know that means next to nothing here, but I'd put GG ahead of Brent based on the fact he actually made the playoffs.

The Sutter Scale is an exclusive measurement of Flames era coaching.

[Frank MetaMusil]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

2011 Brent had 94 points with 11 OT/SOL.

You could have a Calgary Sun Rookie Reporter behind the bench for OT games and this current roster wouldn't lose 11 OT Games.

I should clarify. I don't like either of them. Both bad choices to coach the respective iterations of the Flames.

[JFK]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

2
You could have a Calgary Sun wookie weeporter behind the bench for OT games and this current roster wouldn't lose 11 OT Games.

*fixed

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by JFK

The Sutter Scale is an exclusive measurement of Flames era coaching.

Fair enough. Brent actually won some playoff games with Jersey, but never a series. GG has yet to win a playoff game in his career.

I wish Brent would have had success here. I like the guy.

[Calgary4LIfe]

Originally Posted by ---Hatrick---

For all of you who want GG gone, is there an obvious solution out there that can step in and fix everything immediatley?
Bringing in a new coach a quarter way through the season may make things worse than you all seem it is. And it's not guarantee to get better.

I just don't see things as terribad as you guys are seeing it

I don't think they are as terrible either, but it isn't necessarily the case that a mid-season replacement spells the death knell for this season. The Kings would not have won the cup if they continued to stick with Terry Murray, and similarly the Penguins wouldn't have won if they didn't decide to replace Mike Johnston with Mike Sullivan.

Both of those replacements came in December of their respective seasons, so I do think that Gulutzan has some rope left. I think for him to get replaced, the Flames will still be somewhere on the bubble here, or worse. He just needs to get this team going in the right direction.

This is also the easiest division in all of hockey right now. You have the expansion VGK who are playing over their head right now, Canucks are experiencing more success than can be expected (and both those teams seem to have pretty good coaching), Arizona is the worst team in the league, Edmonton is playing like the Edmonton that we are familiar with, and Anaheim just got dealt yet another long term injury blow as their #1 center will be gone for the next 2 months.

If the Flames are healthy and still out of the playoff picture by December, then I do expect Gulutzan to be replaced. I think it is just too early to make that move. Gulutzan still has time to turn this season around (and he SEEMS to be doing so, even if the Flames did lose yesterday).

I just wouldn't be so definitive in saying that a coaching change spells any hope for salvaging a season. Also, if there is going to be a coaching change, I would rather it happen mid or late season as it just gives more time for the new coach to set systems and become familiar with the team, rather than risk a slow start to the next season.

We will see what happens here, but if there is one thing that the Flames have been abysmal at historically, and that is hiring a good coaching staff. Bob Johnson, Darryl Sutter and Bob Hartley are the only 3 coaches that I think have been good hires. Crisp won a cup with the team, so I won't argue with anyone that wants him included. Other than that, it has been either a long list of mediocre coaching to outright terrible. I feel Gulutzan is a mediocre coach at this point in time, but as long as I see improvement in this team, and taking into account his relative inexperience at the NHL level, I am willing to go through some growing pains.

Either way, I do think he is safe for at least another month. Hopefully this team gets turned around both with their consistency every game, and even more importantly, in the standings. That is the only way that Gulutzan is going to put to rest any thoughts about the Flames replacing him.

[IgiTang]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Actually my post said feel free to criticisize GG in any way you want, but there’s no reason to call another Flames’ fan’s opinion idiotic or that they’re simply “pretending” things are one way simply because they disagree.

I really don’t care if you criticisize GG. I’ve grown less and less convinced of his ability with every game. But what I do think is sad is that we have to be antagonistic to each other surrounding the one thing we can all agree to love and enjoy: Flames hockey.

It’s not politics. We’re all on the same side. It’s just sad that some people forget that on the way to making themselves heard. FOI is the one place where we should have an inherent respect for each other, and posts like the one I quoted just show a complete lack of it.

But that’s just my opinion. If you take offence that I wanted to say we don’t need to go calling each other idiots over opinions on a game that’s supposed to be entertainment, then rail away on the browbeaters.

Lol lol lol... man, what you're talking about others doing is your entire MO and all you do. Give me a break..

[codynw]

Originally Posted by ---Hatrick---

For all of you who want GG gone, is there an obvious solution out there that can step in and fix everything immediatley?
Bringing in a new coach a quarter way through the season may make things worse than you all seem it is. And it's not guarantee to get better.

I just don't see things as terribad as you guys are seeing it

[SportsJunky]

^ That made me laugh. Sutter is a beauty.

[Flamenspiel]

GG is average at best and should be evaluated at the end of the season. The thing is that the timing needs to be adjusted if someone good becomes available as a replacement, you do not want to make a lateral move(someone like Bruce Boudreau). If you read some of the Chicago stuff on the hockey sites its possible that JQ will be available at the end of the year or maybe sooner. I think Sutter would be an improvement, but I think Joel Quenneville would be better.

[Erick Estrada]

Lets be honest in that if you scan the history of the Flames head coaches it boils down to Bob Johnson, Darryl Sutter, Terry Crisp (he won a cup after all), and a whole lot of unremarkable and junk coaches. The bar is set extremely low here and so far Gulutzan looks like just another head coach that's probably going to fall into the latter category. He was brought in after all to tighten up things after Hartley who ran a pretty loose ship defensively. The issue is that this team still makes just as many blunders and defensive mistakes as it did under Hartley. Now I fully believe the players need to accept responsibility for their play but it's also not unreasonable to expect a new head coach to correct issues from his predecessor as for instance how Stevens has brought some offensive creativity to jump start the Kings. Right now I'm not exactly sure what type of team this is. They don't score a lot of goals and they still are a mess defensively so you can argue in some ways the team has taken a bit of a step back because they scored a lot of goals under Hartley. I hate revisiting this thread game to game because it's a long schedule but I'm still waiting for some sort of indication that things are trending in the right direction and I'm just not seeing that. It's really frustrating when you see management go all in on a team and the results are mediocrity because if they don't make any noise this season there's no upcoming draft to salvage anything from the season seeing the picks have mostly been traded.

[Backlunds_socks]

D.Sutter is available.

lol D.utter is censored.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by IgiTang

Lol lol lol... man, what you're talking about others doing is your entire MO and all you do. Give me a break..

“All I do” it isn’t, but sure, I fall into that habit in political threads sometimes. I’ve identified that and am trying to be better, but FOI is all about the Flames, something we’ve all agreed in one way or another to embrace. The majority of us aren’t all pulling the rope in the same direction, no reason to be disrespectful about something as lighthearted and fun as the game of hockey is supposed to be.

Don’t let your opinion of the messenger dissuade you from looking at the opinion itself. I think it’s a pretty reasonable opinion to hold, and I’m simply expressing it, not forcing anyone to act that way, I just think it would be better if we all tried.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

Lets be honest in that if you scan the history of the Flames head coaches it boils down to Bob Johnson, Darryl Sutter, Terry Crisp (he won a cup after all), and a whole lot of unremarkable and junk coaches. The bar is set extremely low here and so far Gulutzan looks like just another head coach that's probably going to fall into the latter category.

It’s tough. I still think GG is a good head coach, but I’m starting to question whether he’s the right coach at the right time. Management has made it very clear we’re all in, and it just seems like GG would be more suited to a rebuilding club that needs to learn things from the ground up (and can afford a long learning process) than a team that needs to be pushed to take the next step. Who knows, maybe GG and Hartley just coached this team in the wrong order, but whatever it is, it feels like something is missing.

[Joborule]

Since Flames don't have a first OR second round pick this season, this cannot be a lost season, and Flames need to not only make the playoffs, but actually win at least one round. The expectation would be that the Flames picks this year would be late ones anyway. We're getting closer to American thanksgiving where you get a good idea of what kind of team you are.

Flames on paper should not be a mediocre team, but that's how they are performing up to this point. Meanwhile a rebuilding team like Vancouver actually looks like they may be for real, and won't be a pushover this season. How come that team can exceed expectations, yet GG can't get this team to play up to them? How come this team makes brutal mistakes with more frequency than the opposing team, and other teams in different games? Isn't the Flames suppose to have the best defensive depth in the league? Therefore, they shouldn't be giving up as many grade A chances right?

This team plays fairly sloppy. They don't function like a well tuned machine, where each part does it role efficiently. It's practically been the first line alone that has kept this team afloat. There's been no secondary scoring whatsoever from the bottom lines, and that's just not sustainable. The bottom six is not that bad that it cannot produce period.

The Flames need to be one of the best teams in the league this season. Anything less than May hockey is failed year. Is Glen capable of making the team one of the hardest to beat, and get the team to be a top 2 team in the division? I mentioned before that my confidence in him is nonexistent. The warts on this team that was prevalent last season still show up, and I think that's more of a reflection the coaching than the players themselves. I don't believe he's capable of making the adjustments, or getting this team to the next step of being a contender.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

It’s tough. I still think GG is a good head coach, but I’m starting to question whether he’s the right coach at the right time. Management has made it very clear we’re all in, and it just seems like GG would be more suited to a rebuilding club that needs to learn things from the ground up (and can afford a long learning process) than a team that needs to be pushed to take the next step. Who knows, maybe GG and Hartley just coached this team in the wrong order, but whatever it is, it feels like something is missing.

Yeah it's kind of one of those things that you hope that over time things get sorted out and by middle of the season and this thread is bumped for the right reasons. It's just that I see new to the NHL and relatively unheralded coaches like John Hynes, Bill Peters, even Travis Green to date doing good things with their clubs and with Gulutzan the team seems to be spinning its wheels a bit. I sympathize with GM's as when it comes to hiring head coaches it's a bit of a crap shoot as Green was a runner up for the Flames job and you have to wonder how things would have played out if he got the job.

[TheScorpion]

Sorry for starting this "idiotic thread", although if I may correct you, Res, I'll have you know that I actually started this thread while the Flames were losing, and in fact, I do believe everything that I've said.

Would you say that makes me an idiot? If so, I humbly apologize for my scatterbrained soliloquies, as you may see them.

[GoJetsGo]

Originally Posted by Joborule

= Meanwhile a rebuilding team like Vancouver actually looks like they may be for real, and won't be a pushover this season. .

Sorry, but this isn't the case. They've looked terrible more than once and have benefitted from a lot of luck and playing with zero expectations.

If I recall correctly they had a few hot streaks last year as well before it caught up with them.

It's a long season.

I get that tensions are running high around here and a good size contingent of people are on the verge of semi-panic 24/7... but heaping praise on Vancouver as though the grass is greener is a bit much.

[VilleN]

Originally Posted by TheScorpion

Sorry for starting this "idiotic thread", although if I may correct you, Res, I'll have you know that I actually started this thread while the Flames were losing, and in fact, I do believe everything that I've said.

Would you say that makes me an idiot? If so, I humbly apologize for my scatterbrained soliloquies, as you may see them.

I like this thread. I check it regularly and find it to be a very valid topic. Don't know why anyone would have issues with it.