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Monday, November 5, 2007
GM Waddell doing just fine behind bench
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
There’s powerful local precedent: An Atlanta general manager once fired the guy below him and took the job himself and, after relinquishing the GM position, won 14 division titles. Not that Don Waddell is swayed by the example of Bobby Cox and the Braves.
“No, no,” Waddell said Monday. “I’m not giving up the seat I sit in.”
He meant the GM’s chair. But the more Waddell talked, the more apparent it became that he doesn’t plan to quit either job any time soon. The Thrashers are 5-3 since he stepped in as coach after canning Bob Hartley, and he doesn’t act like a man who’s overwhelmed by the dual responsibilities. Indeed, Waddell said, “When I was doing this [in the minor leagues more than a decade ago], I always thought my strength was as a bench coach.”
This marks the second time Waddell has done the interim-coach-permanent-GM thing with the Thrashers, and the results have been even better than the first, which wasn’t so bad [4-5-1 after dismissing Curt Fraser on Dec. 26, 2002]. The difference is that Waddell was actively pursuing a new coach back then. He isn’t now. “I’ve not asked permission to speak to anyone,” he said. “We’re not on the fast track.”
Why rush to change what’s finally working? The Thrashers just concluded a seven-game road trip in which they could, Waddell conceded, “have buried ourselves. If we’d have been 2-12, there’s no coming back from that.” Instead they won four times and are within telescopic sight of .500. Having started the season 0-6, this constitutes definite progress.
Another heartening development: Ilya Kovalchuk is again ascendant. Coming off a tepid-by-his-standards season (only 76 points in 2006-2007, down 22 from 2005-2006), he managed four points in the Thrashers’ first six games. He has 15 in eight games under Waddell, and he’s coming off consecutive hat tricks. This isn’t to say Kovalchuk was dogging it under Hartley — on the contrary, he was one of the deposed coach’s last defenders — but he and Waddell have a deeper bond.
“That’s the reason why I’m here,” said Kovalchuk, speaking of Waddell. “He brought me to this country and drafted me No. 1. When he’s behind the bench, it’s a little bit special for me.”
“It goes back to the first time he was in town [for an interview before the 2001 draft],” Waddell said. “I basically kidnapped him. He had his agent with him and I had one of our PR guys, and they went to the bathroom and I said, ‘You take the agent; I’ll take Kovy.’ I’ve watched him grow up, not just as a player but as a person.”
For whatever reason, Hartley didn’t choose to play Kovalchuk on the same line as Marian Hossa, the Thrashers’ second-best player. Waddell has deployed the two in tandem with center Todd White, and the result has been that the team has found its lost offense.
The Thrashers scored nine goals in their first six games; they’ve managed 28 in the past eight. Waddell has those numbers written on a stat sheet in his office. He’d been doing some back-of-the-envelope figuring before Monday’s practice, and he liked what he found.
“As we continue through this thing, we can’t hire a [permanent] coach just for the sake of hiring a coach,” Waddell said, and if the Thrashers keep winning with him calling out line changes, why hire anyone at all?
True, there’s only one other coach/GM (Jacques Martin of Florida) in the 30-team NHL, but Waddell is getting more from Kovalchuk than Hartley was, and this franchise revolves around the left winger. A coach who can maximize Kovalchuk’s abundant gifts is worth keeping even if he’s not a coach by trade.
Reading from another set of handwritten numbers, Waddell said: “In the first six games, Kovy played an average of 20 minutes and 19 seconds. In the last eight he’s played an average of 22 minutes and 34 seconds.”
Smart coaching, a visitor suggested.
“Smart GM’ing,” Waddell said, and then he laughed.
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