Coaching and management changes around the league
- Thread starter herman
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Guru Tugginmypuddah
Well-known member
herman said:
An envelope is left on his desk daily, and only at the end of the day, not at the start. Oh and if you break a mug in the break room, expect your daily stipend to be deducted.
herman said:
He gets paid per win plus bonuses for successful trades and draft pick selections.
He also gets penalized for every leak that comes out of his office. Oh, sorry, wait, that was in Fenton's contract.
Guru Tugginmypuddah
Well-known member
herman said:and 30-50 bags of these bad boys
Perfect snack if you are following a low-carb regimen.
louisstamos
Active member
herman said:and 30-50 bags of these bad boys
I understood this reference.
Here's that Carolina story:
https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/luke-decock/article233585707.html
https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/luke-decock/article233585707.html
Coco-puffs
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
I've read a number of stories and I totally get where Dundon is coming from. His VP's in his other companies don't have "contracts" in the way that NHL GM's do. They are employees, with agreed upon compensation, bonus structures, vacation, etc. There is no "term" on this type of employee contract, in the same sense we have it with most of our daily jobs. (ie, I signed a contract when I started each of my jobs as a professional and mostly its legal stuff, non-compete clauses, etc... there is no term on them)
It definitely bucks the trend of what is done in the NHL, where teams usually agreed to a certain length of contract with their GM's. If they are fired, they still have to be paid to the full length of their contract. I can see why Dundon may want to avoid that. It does come with the drawback that the GM can leave at any time for a better offer since there is no statement in a contract that doesn't allow you to just seek a new job elsewhere. As Dundon states, he wouldn't hold anyone back.
I think the media is making a big deal about it only because it goes against the grain- but really, its kinda normal business practice outside of sports.
Kin
New member
Coco-puffs said:
I think the bigger drawback is that unless you can find someone who would choose to have no stability or guarantees over having stability and guarantees then by having this policy you're effectively relegating yourself to the least in-demand candidates for the job. Because so much of running a sports team is presenting yourself as being willing to do anything to win, having a policy that virtually guarantees you'd be ranked 31st on a list of teams to work for will make for tough sledding if your team struggles.
Coco-puffs
New member
Nik the Trik said:
I don't disagree. The job there won't be a destination, especially for guys with experience and cachet around the league as a good executive. But there are only 31 spots and 200 hockey men probably vying for them, so its not like he's gonna have a position that won't have some good candidates. Dundon will probably like looking outside the realm of 200 hockey men too. It might not end up being a path to success, and that is the risk he seems willing to take.
Coco-puffs said:
I don't know if this whole contract thing was the #1 reason for it but it was well reported that the Canes had difficulties hiring a new GM after Francis was let go.
Kin
New member
Coco-puffs said:
Well, except I'd argue that finding 31 good GMs among those 200 has proven pretty difficult even with everyone being signed to contracts. The thing about sports at this level isn't really about being "good" at your job as I'm pretty convinced that if I got hired to run a NHL team tomorrow I wouldn't embarrass myself too badly but rather it's about where you rank on that list of 31. Look at the trouble teams around the league have gotten into by virtue of having a bad GM, now imagine your team has a policy that almost guarantees you'll have the worst GM in the league from year to year.
Because the second effect here is that if Dundon does find someone good, and I agree that going outside the typical pool of GM hires opens up some intriguing possibilities for him, the nature of the business is that as soon as that person develops that sort of cachet they'd probably leave as soon as they got a decent offer from elsewhere. Imagine that happening before a trade deadline or July 1st or draft?
Nik the Trik said:
Or a month before training camp opens...
Coco-puffs
New member
Nik the Trik said:
Bolded my favourite part- we know you are ready to add to the conversation
(And this is a place for conversation, so don't take that the wrong way)I hadn't stated it because I thought it was obvious, but yes, without a contract and one of the lowest salaries in the league for the position, anyone good would be much easier to poach. Since most teams don't make those types of changes at the trade deadline or July 1st (or mid-summer) there usually isn't an opening at those times where said person would get poached.
One thing I might add here- I think we put too much stock into the GM. They make the final decision and are the leader of the front office, but ultimately, I think it takes a good front office as a whole to succeed. Obviously a bad GM that doesn't know how to lead a front office is a killer (Fenton), but a good front office with smart people giving you good information to go on makes it much easier to succeed- and potentially, move forward with someone new at the top if it comes to it. And an owner who seems VERY involved in decisions might mean that the GM role in Carolina doesn't actually give you final say.
Ultimately, Dundon is taking a big risk here betting that his way of doing it will be fine. I may not be as skeptical as you are, but believe me I'm still skeptical. I was just presenting ideas as to why it might work out.
Finally, I disagree entirely that this method guarantees you'd have the worst GM in the league year to year. The bar for that isn't too high in the NHL IMO. And as I stated above, having a good front office (Tulsky!) can mitigate not having one of the top GM's in the league.
Kin
New member
Coco-puffs said:
Except if hypothetically we're dealing with a talented poach-worthy front office type not only would that create an incentive to possibly make changes whenever you could in the service of landing them but that's also assuming that you would only ever poach someone to fill a vacancy as opposed to just adding to a talented front office. If Carolina has someone worth hiring then it might well be in the interest of a team to give them a raise and a guaranteed contract while making them an AGM or DPP or Director of Hockey Ops or whatever.
Coco-puffs said:
Well, I think that's the real story here buried underneath everything else. It's why I compared it to the way Jerry Jones runs the Cowboys which, to put it charitably, has had mixed results.
Coco-puffs said:
Except having a situation where there's likely to be instability at the top probably severely restricts your ability to build that good front office. Again, if the "good" front office people you're looking to hire are looking for any kind of stability they're probably not going to be enticed by an offer from the one team that has committed themselves to giving the worst offers in the league and where the Boss himself has no idea if he'll be there next week.
Like I said above, while this creates a serious problem in trying to land a good GM, the problem almost certainly gets worse when you're talking about people below that as they're far more susceptible to being poached laterally and while I maybe agree that we think of GMs too narrowly as "good" or "bad" at their jobs the real problem here would be a lack of continuity as organizational direction being inconsistent year to year is probably a greater concern than a "bad" GM. If that consistency is supposed to be coming from Dundon, well, I'm pretty confident in saying that owners making those decisions is almost certainly a bad idea.