Jeff Paterson: Thoughts on Ryan Johnson's press conference on hiring Manny Malhotra. Can they fix EP40?
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What did Ryan Johnson announce about Manny Malhotra becoming Canucks head coach?
Sekarison Price from the Historic Wall Center, now joined by Jeff Patterson, our Canucks reporter, the host of Rinkwide Vancouver, who took in the Rian Johnson media availability today. But we'll start with Manny. Jeff, it's real now. What do you make of the news?
I'm just processing the fact that the three of us are in the same time zone for the first time in a long time. It's been a while. So it's good. Get the band back together. Our band's back together.
So is theirs. Exactly.
Yeah. They're taking our lead. I think, you know, influencers that we are no surprise, right? Obviously no surprise that Manny has ascended to the role of the 23rd head coach of the Vancouver Canucks and good on him. Yeah. Now the hard work begins. He inherits a last place team and a roster that has all sorts of holes, but it's going to be interesting to see how it goes from here. I asked Ryan Johnson specifically that question about how do we gauge the job that Manny does, given the fact that it's a stated rebuild, that he's coming in, he understands the assignment here. And Ryan talked about, again, it's a lot about the culture and the work habits and the work ethic and that eventually the wins will take care of themselves.
But in the short term, it's about trying to identify the kinds of players that Manny can work with, that the team can win with over the long haul. And so I think basically in saying that, Ryan Johnson's saying the pressure is off Manny, as it should be. Certainly, I know it's high stakes and it's professional sports, but the expectations are going to be relatively low in terms of the on-ice product for the Vancouver Canucks. People just want to see an honest effort. They want to see the growth and development of some of those key young players, and they're going to continue to inject young players as we go here. So, you know, I think for me, the one thing that I really admire about Manny Malholtri is this is a guy that,
had lived an NHL life, 991 games as a player, adding his playoff experience over 1,000 games, and then got into coaching and started in the lowest ranks of coaching as an eye in the sky under Travis Green, wanted a bench role, wasn't going to happen here, went to Toronto. But through it all, he's still living the NHL lifestyle. He's working in Toronto. And he elected to step back. And that's not a move that we see from a lot of people. He knew that he wanted to be a head coach and his best path was to take an American Hockey League job. And we all saw what he did in the first year winning the Calder Cup. Ryan Johnson spoke a lot today about people will look at this past season
How did Jeff Paterson summarize Manny Malhotra’s coaching challenges with a last-place roster?
and wonder you know was it a failure in any way and he he sort of marveled at the work that manny did and really that said that it wasn't a whole lot different than it was in the calder cup championship that manny's hands were tied that so many of the players uh they expected to have an abbotsford were up with the big team a lot of the players they had in abbotsford were injured the challenges were great and manny you know, came to the rink every day, that same approach, trying to help guys, caring about the players, trying to nurture them and help them, didn't result in wins and losses and certainly didn't yield another championship, but Ryan Johnson just talked about nothing really wavered and that's one of the things that he admires about Matty Malholtra.
So, You know, it would have made perfect sense had the Canucks promoted Manny Mel Holter after winning the Calder Cup. It would look pretty linear. Guy wins a championship, give him the big seed. It didn't work out that way, but everything happens for a reason. And so Manny's got another year of head coaching experience under his belt. And now it's go time. And, you know, we'll have to wait till September, obviously, to see what it looks like on the ice. But I do think given where the organization is right here, right now, Manny Malhotra seems like the right guy for the job.
Yeah, he gets his hands back on to a lot of the prospects that, of course, were with him in that Calder Cup championship and maybe gets a couple of them, like Elias Pettersson, back on track just a little bit as well.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What did Ryan Johnson announce about Manny Malhotra becoming Canucks head coach?
0:03–2:33
2
How did Jeff Paterson summarize Manny Malhotra’s coaching challenges with a last-place roster?
2:33–4:10
3
What did Ryan Johnson say about measuring Manny’s success during a rebuild?
4:10–8:18
4
How does Manny’s playing and AHL experience prepare him to coach the Canucks?
8:18–14:08
Speakers
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