 |
| |
|
 |
 |
 |
Iron curtain The Panthers choose to 'dance with the devil'Posted: Monday December 03, 2001 3:21 PM
He’s baaaaccckk. The NHL is a more lively place when Mike Keenan is involved, and coaching a guy who at times can look like the league’s most disinterested player, Pavel Bure, should add to the intrigue this time around. CNNSI.com spoke to Sports Illustrated senior writer Michael Farber about the changes in the offing and why Duane Sutter and Bill Torrey had to be sacked. CNNSI.com: Is this a tale that can be traced to the Brothers’ Grimm, Pavel and Valeri ? Farber: This was certainly not a fairy tale. CNNSI.com: How did Duane Sutter and the Panthers become such a bad fit? Farber: Duane Sutter was in the right place at the wrong time. This almost certainly can be traced to a failure to get his best player on board, who, for better or worse was Pavel Bure. Sutter asked Bure to do things defensively that he wasn’t comfortable doing, and it led to a deepening schism between Bure and his teammates. In the modern coaching era, if you don’t have your best players on board you operate at your own peril. CNNSI.com: There have been times we've seen Bure’s almost shameless neglect for backchecking, or him even picking up a guy streaking into the Panthers’ zone. This has to be a problem. Farber: At his worst, Pavel Bure is the water wings of the NHL. He floats. He always has, he’s looking for a breakout. There are very few players who can get away with it, but because he scored 59 goals last season he was given greater leeway. You’ll notice that the first game without either Bure in the lineup, Florida beat Anaheim 6-0. CNNSI.com: Without laying this at Pavel’s feet, what about the team led to this point? Farber: With certain teams, the mix is wrong. The Panthers didn’t have the right straws stirring the drink. I think the talent might be better than six wins but the talent is only so-so. They need a lot from Bure, and they need a coach that can get him on board. CNNSI.com: A natural segue. What intrigues you about Mike Keenan in Miami? Farber: Mike Keenan is a turnaround specialist. The Bruins didn’t make the playoffs at the end of last season, but Keenan revived that team. I thought he did more than a reasonable job. He helped make Joe Thornton a better player, which might be his legacy in Boston. Keenan makes people nervous. He makes management nervous and he makes players nervous. These aren’t bad things, by the way. A little creative tension never hurt anyone. He has become an owner’s pick. GMs are going to be on thin ice. And he can bully players and be capricious, but, again, he does have portfolio. He won a Cup and he took two other teams to the finals. He has won Canada Cups. My question is, why do you hire a coach like Keenan, unless you plan to give him the GM title as well? The Panthers have given that job to Chuch Fletcher, which might be difficult because Keenan fills in the void and likes the power of GM. If you hire a mismatched GM, then you start all over again. Florida may have put the cart before the horse in a way. CNNSI.com: With a new front office, should we expect roster changes sooner rather than later? Farber: We’ll have to wait to see what Keenan’s powers will be in order to asses the personnel changes, but the first thing he does is improve the fitness level. Mike Keenan's practices are second to none. Detroit consistently runs the best practice, but the Keenan practices are even better in terms of fitness. The other thing he does is try to establish a base of loyal players, often that means moving out local heroes, which he did in St. Louis with Brendan Shanahan, in Chicago with Denis Savard and Vancouver with Trevor Linden and Kirk MacLean. Then he gets players who aren’t sacred cows and will be loyal to Keenan. Woody Allen had Tony Roberts and Julie Kavner, there are also the Mike Keenan players. Stephane Matteau and Brian Noonan fit into that category. I don’t know who those people might be, but this is something to keep an eye on. CNNSI.com: Why Mike Keenan? Farber: People are thinking. “Here is another warmed over coach. How can they just recycle the same bodies?” But Keenan has had success. Argue with his methods. Argue with his personality. But he has something on his resume. You dance with the devil when you hire Mike Keenan, but he has had results. Things had just deteriorated with the Panthers and he’s your No. 1 turnaround specialist. But it will be very interesting to watch him work and see if he can get the results. A little creative tension never hurt anyone. CNNSI.com: What will Keenan have to work with in Florida and what do you think he’d like to do with that team? Farber: First, he has a fabulous young goalie in Roberto Luongo, who, given time and proper nurturing will be a premier goalie who will win a couple of Vezinas. Luongo is the next generation of goalies, a star in the making. And they have the two Bures. I think the most important thing Mike Keenan can do is bring this team together, get Bure and his teammates working in sync. When Pavel played in Vancouver he was a star, but also part of a group. I’d reinforce that with the team, find a way to get him playing as part of the group. How much power he'll have to make moves is tough to say right now. The first issue is to fix what’s going on there, get Pavel and the boys to kiss and make up.
Sports Illustrated senior writer Michael Farber covers the NHL beat for the
magazine and is a regular contributor to CNNSI.com.
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
