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Chapter 1: What news does Bob share about Mike Babcock's coaching approval?
Hey, it's Bob Stauffer. I just wanted to let you know that you can listen to Oilers Now ad-free on Amazon Music, included with Prime. Welcome, everybody. This is Bob Stauffer in the 880 Ched Studios, the city's sell side, and this is Oilers Now. It's been an interesting day. If you have not heard, we're going to get to some of that fairly quickly. Earlier today,
The National Hockey League issued the following statement. The league has completed its review of Mike Babcock's tenure in Columbus and of certain alleged conduct associated therewith. Our investigation has concluded that even in a light least favorable to Mr. Babcock, there is no current basis to restrict his employment in the league. The NHLPA... also put out a release today.
While we found the allegation of Mike Babcock's conduct as the Columbus Blue Jackets head coach very concerning, the league has decided that there's no current basis on which to restrict his employment. Moving forward, we expect Mr. Babcock will uphold the high standards required of NHL head coaches.
A week ago Monday, when the story broke that the Edmonton Oilers were looking at Mike Babcock, and if you listened to this show over the course of the last five weeks, dating back to when Chris Knobloch was relieved, along with Mark Stewart, of his duties, we consistently mentioned Babcock as a viable option, especially in light of the fact that there was a prevailing sense out there
that no one was sure of the contract status of Bruce Cassidy in Boston. And we talked about the potential of coaches, i.e. Cassidy, Peter Laviolette, Daryl Sutter, Craig Berube. to name a few, maybe even Barry Trotz. But we constantly mentioned Babcock. I actually had people in this market say, how dare anybody mention Mike Babcock as a potential candidate?
I can't imagine what it would be like to be that perfect, to have that perspective on things, to have never made a mistake or rubbed somebody off the wrong way in meeting with them, to be that incredibly pious.
Anyhow, I do think, you know, we had some, when Darren Drager's report leaked out a week ago Monday that the owners were looking at Babcock, we were pretty strong with what we had to say on the show that day. Ownership, management, and the players all on board. Mike Babcock is their guy. I could have sat there and said, well, you know what, let's just see how all of this plays out.
But what I said was, barring a complication. And then we started to see some things Tuesday, Wednesday. Well, you know, there's more. There's more there. And suddenly, an incredible amount of people in oil country, in one of the greatest hockey markets on the planet. And I wouldn't debate that some of you might have a better idea of what's going on in Anaheim than some people in Anaheim.
Or a better idea of what's going on in Detroit. Those are the people that are in Detroit.
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Chapter 2: What conclusions did the NHL reach regarding Babcock's conduct?
Or what's going on in Toronto or Columbus. Look, people know the game here, and they read, and they're educated. But I don't know how many of you have actually ever met Mike Babcock or dealt with Mike Babcock on a personal perspective. Some of you listening to this show want the opportunity to meet somebody before they judge them. And again, here's the thing.
There is nothing that I can say today for those of you that hate what looks like is going to be headed down an inevitable path. There's nothing that we're going to be able to say today that's going to say, damn it, Stauffer's right. You know, so what if it's, I don't care if some of the best players on the planet are or the management, or the owner thought, you know what?
This would be a great guy to get. He's a terrific coach. He's had a great history. He's won a lot. He's the only coach in the triple gold club in history of hockey. He's probably considered a top five to top ten. Oh, by the way, just so we're clear here, it's not just going to be Mike Babcock coming in. It's going to be another high-caliber coach with –
nhl head coaching experience who might be the perfect combination with my where you are headed down that path where this is an inevitability probably say tuesday next week sunday's father's day my father was not a hockey fan uh he worked hard he expected me to work hard He blamed himself for the fact that because of some family challenges that we had that maybe I didn't go farther in hockey.
And I told him I didn't go farther in hockey because I wasn't good enough. It's that simple. I wasn't mature enough, though I was physically mature at that age. But the one thing he said to me is rule number one in life. Believe none of what you hear and half of what you see. And we have a lot of people out there that are super judgmental, and I know exactly how this is going to roll, okay?
You're going to get a considerably more experienced coaching staff this upcoming season than you had last year. There is no way to underscore the mammoth loss of Glenn Goldson to Chris Knobloch's staff. Because for a lot of those players, they probably felt if you're going to fire Jay Woodcroft, maybe talk to the players because they'd tell you that Glenn Goldson should have coached that team.
How good of a coach was Glenn Goldson? Jim Neal, one of the best general managers in the National Hockey League, fired him back in 2013 or so and rehired him like 13 years later. There's not a lot of guys that would do that in the business. But I can tell you that the Oilers players had an immense amount of respect for Glenn Gullitson.
And the Oilers staff this past season, they missed him in a big way. Leon Drysaddle said it the best. We have two years. That's what he said. And everybody thought he was solely talking about Conor McDavid. No, we have two years here. And the Oilers opted to make a move. And they made a move and involved a lot of different people in the process.
And so just because you don't like it, some of you, some others of you are like, you know what? I'm comfortable with it. Dammit, if the best players in the world think it's a good idea and the organization from the owner to the managers to the players are like, this is the guy. And it's not just Babcock. It's going to be another significant coach with him, a coach that's –
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Chapter 3: What were the reactions to Babcock's potential hiring by the Oilers?
I personally think that Mike is one of the greatest coaches in the game. I never had any issues, and none of my clients had any issues with Babcock. My clients want to be pushed. They want to be coached. And my clients would love to win more than anything. That's from a real agent that's going out.
And saying this, we're going to have another agent come down the pipe, a guy that's got a similar-sized book, a similar-sized agency as Dan Milstein, Jerry Johansson at 435 today. And I'm going to bet you Jerry's going to tell you he thinks Babcock's a pretty good coach too. But somebody said, oh, I can't believe Stauffer didn't quote this guy who quoted an unnamed agent.
Well, put your name to it if you're going to say it. Who knows? Maybe that unnamed agent has two clients in the National Hockey League right now, not a stable of 35 to 40 clients. But you know who I think really might have said it the best over the course of the last?
It might have been Brian Lawton, who's been an agent and been an NHL GM and been a number one overall pick in the NHL draft as we go into the Oilers Now Audio Vault.
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Here is what Brian Lawton had to say Tuesday because there was an inference that there was a smoking gun involving Babcock. Well, that is not the clip, guys. This is live radio at its finest, complete with a mistake. Okay, that happens. Nobody needs to get upset. The patient doesn't die on the table. It's just radio. We're not making a morality play here.
So let's see if we can endeavor during the course of the Brian Lawton interview to hear the part where he specifically talked about the fact that he did his work. He did his own. He called around and said that there... That is an interesting clip, though. He said that he thought the Oilers could beat Vegas and beat Carolina. So we'll get you to see if we can... Well, here's what we'll do.
We'll go to break here in a couple moments. But I do think that Brian brought up a very valid point. Like, as it's turned out, Brian's right. There wasn't, quote-unquote, a smoking... Now, again... I'm not naive to this, okay? I get there's some of you texting the show right now on the Ashley Fine Floors text line at 780-451-8800 saying, I don't care.
I hate this idea that Mike Babcock's getting an opportunity here. Mike's done dumb things, and he's a bully, and that's how I see it, and there's nothing you can say, Stauffer, and the orders organization are idiots, and that's just the way it is, okay? Probably not going to be able to convince you otherwise. I'm not even going to try. I'm just going to tell you what's going to happen.
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Chapter 4: How did the Oilers' management and players feel about Babcock?
Where is it? What is it? I've heard a lot of talk about it. I know there's some things that are supposedly happening now. Right. I've called many of the people involved with that myself, and I have not been able to find anything. That doesn't mean there's something there, but time is of the essence. Right. It's a little bit.
the way this whole thing has kind of worked out, in my opinion, and not just in all the... You know, in America, you're supposed to be innocent until proven guilty. It's not what somebody said may have happened or this happened, and I've heard everything on this. I look forward to hearing, you know, what the final say is on it. Yeah. Because it's gone on, in my opinion...
You know, if you really look at when this thing happened, it was quite a while ago. Why things are happening now, I don't really understand, to be honest with you, because, you know, we're in a society now where we don't look the other way just because somebody may not continue working. Right. You did something wrong. You did something wrong. And, you know, I just think it would have surfaced.
at this stage, but I could be wrong, and we'll find out.
Well, we found out. And Mr. Babcock is free to be employed as a head coach of the Edmonton Hunters. And as we stated a week ago Monday, he is their guy. And as I am telling you today, he won't be the only guy coming in, and it's going to be a very experienced tandem. Two quick texts.
In the Ashley Fine Flores text line, Colin says, Bob, 80 years ago, Alberta was known as the Bible Belt, a fertile seedbed for self-righteous, judgmental, condemnatory thinking. The religious fervor is greatly diminished today. The underlying lifeblood of it all very much remains. This text comes in. James from Calgary.
So after all the pomp and circumstance, the league found nothing significant. Shocker. The owners don't look foolish, says James. The league does, and Vegas looks panty in their treating of their former Stanley Cup winning coach so poorly. Good for us. Whiny fans don't understand how much better our coaching is going to be. Good for our leaders. Good for our leaders wanting a lion.
We won't be outcoached next year. Again, you can text us at 780-451-8800. Another James says, Bob, I have some reservations with Babcock, but I remember two Olympic golds, a world junior gold, a world cup, men's world gold, and a couple other championships. Again, you can text us at 780-451-8800. There we go. Bob, this one comes to us from Rob.
With Babcock and DJ Smith coming in, do you look at their past and players that had success under them? Which of these players could be signed in free agency or traded for that had success under those two in the past? And they mentioned Freddie Anderson, Corey Perry trading for Connor Brown. Ilya Mikheyev, keeping Kasperi Kapanen, Scott Lawton, et cetera, from Rob. Well, that's a good question.
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