Lou can’t hear you, his Stanley cup rings are clogging his ears. (and since he has 3, 1 nostril is being clogged as well…)

Posted by Kstewy16 on 07/02/09 at 12:38 AM ET

Your articles would be a lot easier to read if you didn’t write in such small sentences.  Try using some commas and combining a couple of thoughts and ideas together.  Just a word of advice that will give your pieces a little more flow.

Posted by Chase on 07/02/09 at 12:39 AM ET

Lou can’t hear you, his Stanley cup rings are clogging his ears.

A poor argument.  Since Lamoriello has won the Stanley Cup in the past, you are assuming he cannot possibly make a mistake ever?

Posted by PuckStopsHere on 07/02/09 at 12:43 AM ET

A poor argument.  Since Lamoriello has won the Stanley Cup in the past, you are assuming he cannot possibly make a mistake ever?

I made an argument? Really? I thought I made a joke, but whatever.

I guess I know for next time, Mr. Serious doesn’t like humor.

Posted by Kstewy16 on 07/02/09 at 12:49 AM ET

lol

Posted by Oilers Rock from Edmonton, Alberta on 07/02/09 at 01:51 AM ET

and Pete DeBoer isn’t going anywhere in Florida,he had them competing for a playoff spot,getting Clemmenson is huge.having a guy like DeBoer who knows how to spot talent helping whoever is GM there is only going to help the Panthers.

Posted by Speedy Sammich from DTown on 07/02/09 at 06:12 AM ET

for a second there, i thought it read “some poorly run blogs”

Posted by Luongo-is-my-hero on 07/02/09 at 06:43 AM ET

You cannot write, dude, this is like reading a first-year undergrad’s essay.  Bad grammar, simpleton sentences, and horrible colloquialisms.  Plus, you obviously don’t know a god damned thing about hockey.  The New Jersey Devils poorly run?  Jesus.

Posted by Hector on 07/02/09 at 08:04 AM ET

And another thing, it’s Randy SexTon, not SexSon.  Learn the names of the people you’re writing about, son, it’ll give you credibility, even if your opinions are ridiculously stupid.

Posted by Hector on 07/02/09 at 09:42 AM ET

The New Jerseyvils have done poorly when it comes to managing their coaches.  Even when things appear to be going reasoanably well, they are the team most likey to fire a coach during the stretch run.  Most recently, they fired current coach of the year Claude Julien when he appeared to be doing a pretty good job.  It is a calculated move that Lou Lamoriello makes with relative frequency in an effort to try to shock a better playoff performance from his team (and it doesn’t always work in 2007 after firing Julien, Lou led the team to a first round defeat).

The effect of this is to make it clear that New Jersey is a short term job for any coach.  That alone discourages some of the better coaches (those with other options) from being interested in the job.  It is a big part of the reason Brent Sutter left.  He would be in the final year of his contract next year if he stayed and thus he would be very likely to be fired even if he did a good job.  If I knew I would likely be fired in the upcoming year - independant of my performance - I would look for a new job as well.  When the job in in Sutter’s home province working for his brother the offer was too good to pass up.  Had Lou been better at managing coaches the situation may have been different.

He is further exacerbating the situation by not hiring a new coach when his team is still being built.  By being the last team to hire a coach he has a smaller pool of contenders.  The pool continues to get smaller as potential coaches find some other employment for next year.  Further it shows other potential coaches in the future how lowly Lou sees his coach.

The solution may be to hire Jacques Lemaire, who has a good track record in New Jersey.  If that is the case he should do so.  The fact he hasn’t implies a problem may exist.  As time passes he will likely be stuck with a coach that nobody else would be interested in.  More than likely this man is John MacLean, who is a current New Jersey assistant coach.  No other team would ever hire him as their head coach and he is an easy fire whenever Lou wants to.  He is exactly the kind of coach that New Jersey will likely be stuck with - one with no other head coaching options - one that is a selection from the bottom of the barrel.

Of course that in no way says New Jersey is a horrible organization that cannot win.  It is easy to prove that is false, but in this aspect (which is essentially a follow up to stuff I wrote last year) they are a poorly run organization.

Posted by PuckStopsHere on 07/02/09 at 10:56 AM ET

TPSH,

You hit on an essential truth in your extended comment. The New Jersey Devils are very much a GM-centric team, similar to the Oakland A’s under Billy Bean (at least, as the book “Moneyball” would have you believe). In such a scheme, the coach is an interchangeable part.

There have been a parade of coaches in New Jersey over the last 15 years since the first Cup win in 1995—10 changes with 8 different bodies (the other two repeat performances by Larry Robinson and Lou Lamoriello). Yet the Devils’ style and system remains essentially unchanged. I’ll leave it to a day-to-day watcher of the Devils to point out the significant differences between the Pat Burns Devils versus the Larry Robinson Devils versus the Brent Sutter Devils, if any. From a distance, those coaching differences appear minute at best, and it seems Lou just wants someone who can management the temperature of the dressing room.

Lamoriello has much more pressing issues than retooling his coaching staff, however. Brian Gionta, Michael Rupp, John Madden and Scott Clemmensen have all departed via free agency, so he’s got some roster holes to plug. Once the personnel is in place, then Lou can busy himself to find someone to stand on the bench, chew ice and open the doors for the shift changes.

Posted by Matthew McCallum from Redding, California on 07/02/09 at 02:08 PM ET