This Team Is A Pinto With 50,000 Miles On It

The big news in hockey this week has been the slow-motion firing of Vancouver Canucks' coach Bruce Boudreau. It's been rumoured that he was on the way out for a while now, and then it was leaked that the team was interviewing replacements, all the while with Boudreau trying to go about his job. It was a surreal, and - most observers agree, cruel - situation.

Although the team's behaviour was roundly criticized, I can't help but think that Canadian hockey journalists are still missing the bigger picture. For one thing, few people have mentioned that this is the second straight season with a mid-season coach-firing for the Canucks, something rarely seen in even the worst-run franchises. 

Then there's the question of the replacement. The coach that management really really wanted is Rick Tocchet. He has six years of experience, but his only playoff appearance was the Covid season where the playoffs were expanded so that three-quarters of the league qualified. Boudreau, on the other hand, has made the playoffs in all but one of his ten complete seasons. Yes, I know, it's become a standard of business that new management wants "their guy," but this stretches the concept to new depths.

My point is that if an NFL team were acting like this, then right about now I'd be writing a post about how I'm sick of the term, "dumpster fire," and we should really come up with some more metaphors for deep organizational incompetence. I don't know, "moldy basement," maybe? But in hockey journalism - in Canada, anyway - people aren't willing to call it what it is.

I see a parallel with how the media talks about players. I've noticed that even if they talk about a play being "dirty," they're unwilling to label the player who does the deed as a "dirty player." And this continues even when it's not his first offence. He's still a Good Hockey guy with lots of Character, just one who happens to make dirty plays on a regular basis. And now the same attitude applies to franchises. The Canucks are a First-Class Organization, that just keeps making stupid or immoral decisions.