Like I said he doesn't always know when to keep his mouth shut, but i think he's a very good GM and if that's his weakness I don't really give a flying ****.
Good point. I'd sure rather be playing for Lombardi right now, because I'd still be playing. Good luck to your Kings. They are making it look easy!
Eakins is a great coach and is very well respected. He also has had a rough life. Damian Cox just wrote a great article this week about the Marlies with plenty of background on Eakins life.
Here is a snippet and the link below:
At one point, two aunts tried to help Eakins track down the whereabouts of Yoder, his birth father.
“I didn’t want to meet him,” he says. “I just wanted to see him.”
Eventually, he learned that Yoder had died at age 55.
In 1995, while Eakins was moving up and down from the NHL and the minors, his mother felt pain in her side after not feeling well for a few months. She checked into hospital. Two weeks later, she was dead of cancer that had spread throughout her body. She was just 51.
That was hard enough. Within a matter of months, the man Eakins had grown to call “dad,” the man who had brought a fatherless boy north and called him his son, began to distance himself.
“After my mother died, it was like he unzipped his body and somebody else stepped out,” Eakins says.
Family differences became open wounds. By the time Eakins was being sent down by Phoenix to Springfield the next fall, his adoptive father no longer wanted anything to do with Dallas.
The estrangement went on for years, more than a decade. Neilson encouraged Eakins to reach out to his father, to cross that seemingly impassable divide.
“He kept saying, ‘There’s gotta be a way,’” says Eakins.
When Jim Eakins’ mother passed, Dallas quietly arrived late to the funeral, not wanting to start a family row. As he was leaving, he saw his dad in the parking lot.
“He stared at me. It was like he wanted me to know he saw me,” says Eakins. “And then he just turned away.”
The distance between them was never closed. In September of 2008, Eakins got the news. His adoptive father had taken his own life, using the same .22 rifle his mother Carol had once used to shoot snakes.
Someone said it before. I'd like an actual hiring process. Credentials submitted, interviews conducted. Then hire someone with a clear vision for how to take this team to the next level.
Someone said it before. I'd like an actual hiring process. Credentials submitted, interviews conducted. Then hire someone with a clear vision for how to take this team to the next level.
I agree. You'll always have a group of fans who love the new coach, another that hates the new coach, and some in between.
As for Eakins, I know that he was quite upset that the Leafs hired Carlyle but it wasn't in a negative way. He's actually good friends with Carlyle but he's a competitive guy too.
Interesting that Nick said it sucked Dale was leaving. He may have sugar coated it, but I tend to think he was being sincere. I wonder if the players actually liked a coach that didn't talk their ear off (outside of the scratches), didn't decide TOI based on salary, and because Nick is getting tired of new coaches. Or, the players simply didn't have enough time to hate him. Players tire of coaches in hockey, it's like a real life drama hockey play.
That description sounds quite a bit like Boudreau's game plan.
If the mental toughness and team defense philosophy have sunk in, perhaps a change back to an offensive HC would be the best route. An attempt to capture the positives of both aspects would be worth a shot considering the personnel on hand.
The distance between them was never closed. In September of 2008, Eakins got the news. His adoptive father had taken his own life, using the same .22 rifle his mother Carol had once used to shoot snakes.[/B]
Interesting that Nick said it sucked Dale was leaving. He may have sugar coated it, but I tend to think he was being sincere. I wonder if the players actually liked a coach that didn't talk their ear off (outside of the scratches), didn't decide TOI based on salary, and because Nick is getting tired of new coaches. Or, the players simply didn't have enough time to hate him. Players tire of coaches in hockey, it's like a real life drama hockey play.
The grass is not always greener.
Haha. Yeah. Great way to build a relationship with your players. Never talk to them. I wonder what Hamrlik, Erskine, Halpern, Knuble, and MP thought of DH's decision.
There are some more straws up there on the top shelf. Way in the back. Keep grasping for them.
That description sounds quite a bit like Boudreau's game plan.
IMO not that similar. BB's strategy was an aggressive fore check but not dump in chase style. Plus BBs system gave dmen more leeway offensively/decision making out there. That being said I like the sounds of Eakins system. I'd like an aggressive fore check system. With the type of hockey the NHL has now it is getting harder and harder to 'score off the rush' type system. Plus with AO's speed apparently declining much rather him being in the offensive zone closer.
Hey guys on twitter saw that Marc Crawford was the leading candidate. Wouldn't mind it at all.
I remember in 09 when Bylsma was hired, the Pens fans have said that his style was much more wide open than Therrien's, but they had all the little details still drilled in their heads from Therrien's tenure, which made the end of that year quite successful. Hopefully if Crawford is the coach, something like that happens.
