If you take a look at a map of the United States, you’ll find that St. Louis is right smack in the middle between the Mississippi Delta and Chicago. Back in the 20’s when the blues were popular music, this was the route that musicians would travel to get to their Sweet Home Chicago. But while they made the trek up to Chicago, the blues became a part of the cultural fabric of St. Louis that is only rivaled by baby back ribs. As popular music has veered from the blues, it still remains part of what makes St. Louis what it is today. Right now, no one understands the blues in St. Louis any better than Andy Murray.
Even though he didnt want to leave, the Blues still let him go...
Saturday afternoon, John Davidson and the St Louis Blues organization decided to go in a different direction and “let Murray go.” No, I’m not sure which direction Murray was going in—and I’m fairly confident that Murray didn’t WANT to go anywhere. Regardless, Murray’s out, Davis Payne is in and the former coach is only left with questions and unfulfilled goals.
It’s always tough to see a guy that I personally like get fired from a position that he put his heart and soul into. Sports are a great escape for people—but sometimes people forget that the coaches and players are just like the rest of us. They do their best to perform at the highest level when they complete their job. When their employer tells them that they didn’t do a good enough job and give them the boot, it hurts just as much as it would if you or I got a pink slip for unsatisfactory job performance.
As much as it sucks to be fired—imagine being fired in the most public way possible. As if that weren’t bad enough, imagine having everyone talking about it on TV, newspapers and the internet. Even asshole hockey bloggers are piling on! It just adds insult to injury.
Unfortunately, Andy Murray might have been the victim of a few things that are out of his control. Most of the time when a coach is fired, fans are happy that he’s gone and a new era of success can finally be ushered in. But when Andy Murray was shown the door, I don’t get the feeling that there was much ill-will felt towards the (former) coach (well, there was some). It was just time for a change.
This isn’t the first time this has happened to Murray. When he was the head coach for the Los Angeles Kings, he led them to a couple of playoff appearances and their only series win in the last 17 years. They were always the most prepared team in every game they played—but were also the victim of some horrific strings of bad luck in the injury department. He ended up losing his job when the entire organization underwent an overhaul with a new general manager, coaching staff, training staff and significantly changed roster. Like so many other people, Murray was caught up in the changes and lost his job.
Once again, Murray has ramblin’ all on his mind. Over the next few months, he’ll be looking for a new job as well as trying to figure out exactly what went wrong in St. Louis. The obvious answer is that the Blues couldn’t win with any consistency ANY games at home. If his 6-13-3 record at home didn’t bury him, it certainly was the final nail in his coffin. But the losses at home weren’t the only reason he was canned.
If guys like David Perron were producing, would Andy Murray still have a job?
There are teams all over the NHL that have issues winning games. But the dangerous elixir that Murray was sipping was the same cocktail that John Stevens drowned himself in when he was in Philadelphia. Here’s the fail-safe recipe for losing your job as an NHL coach: 1 part losses combined with 2 parts expectations. Shake and serve in a chilled glass.
Just to refresh everyone’s memory, Andy Murray was sitting near the top of the coaching world at the end of last season. The Blues exploded down the stretch and earned the #6 seed in the tough Western Conference. Most experts thought that the young Blues had turned the corner from “team with potential” to “team to be feared NOW.” Andy Murray finished 2nd in the Jack Adams Award voting for his efforts. They looked like they were headed towards greatness and he was steering the bandwagon.
But when St. Louis got off to a rough start, Blues management wasn’t as quick to admit that they may have played over their heads at the end of last season. If the team did NOT have the success they did at the end of last season, the expectations would be for growth, not WINS and LOSSES. But because the team caught fire, people all over St. Louis expected not only the playoffs—but to be dangerous in the playoffs. They certainly expected to be better than 12th in the Western Conference at the halfway point of the season.
Maybe when Murray was driving that bandwagon, he was listening to “What Went Wrong In St. Louie”
The truth is that the St. Louis Blues are a young team. They’re extremely talented with a ton of potential—but they’re still a young team. When the youngest members of the team—who shined brightest last season—struggled to start the season, questions started to be raised. As Jeremy Rutherford of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch noted, “(David) Perron (21 years old), Patrik Berglund (21), Erik Johnson (21) and, to a lesser extent, T.J. Oshie (23) have struggled to make the leap the Blues expected this season.”
But before we rush to judge Andy Murray for the players, maybe we should look at how the organization has DEVELOPED the younger players. The majority of the most successful teams in the league would prefer to let their young players develop in juniors (or college), then a year or two in the AHL before they made the jump to the NHL. For a young team that was previously struggling like the St. Louis Blues, their management team decided that wasn’t a luxury that they could afford.
“To give Andy some slack there, we fast-tracked. We did not have the wonderful opportunity to put them in the minor leagues for two or three years, let them develop and become pros before they hit the NHL street. These kids were raw when they got here.” –John Davidson
It’s easier to blame the coach than the young core of players that the foundation is built on. Some people have said that Murray was too much of an old-school coach and couldn’t relate to the young roster in St. Louis. Other people have gone as far as to say that he was too hard on the young players—that he expected too much from them on a daily basis. Even though these are PROFESSIONAL athletes who are EXPECTED to perform at the highest level daily, Andy Murray still answered those concerns on his way out.
“I have high expectations for people. There’s a way to conduct yourself on the ice and off the ice. Quite often, young players don’t realize what it means to be a professional. It’s your conduct off the ice. To me, the hockey part of it is only a small part of the equation. My goal was for these young guys to learn to be good pros, so they would be good Blues for a long time.”
“Everybody thought I was being tough on our young guys. … I took some hits from people because I was trying to mold the assets of the Blues.” –Andy Murray
At the end of the day, head coaches in the NHL have a short shelf life. There are only 30 jobs—and they’re all TEMP jobs at that. When a team starts to underperform or fall tragically short of expectations, all eyes turn to the head coach. It might not sound fair, but coaches understand what they’re signing up for. They are expected to make the team win, win often or find another job. Murray’s successor lost his first game (at home) 6-3 to the Chicago Blackhawks—he’ll learn that lesson as quickly as his predecessor if he doesn’t minimize the blowout losses to divisional rivals.
Time will only tell if Andy Murray catches on with another NHL team next season. His principles of preparation and work ethic are NEVER going to go out of style—whether the players like it or not. Personally, I hope that Andy Murray gets another opportunity to coach at the NHL level. And I hope he doesn’t have to sell his soul at the crossroads to get it.
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
If you noticed, at the end of the 6-3 “blowout” against Chicago, the entire arena was applauding and cheering for the Blues’ performance. Conklin was utterly awful, and the game could have easily been 3-3 going into overtime. Other than that, the fans liked what they saw. And what they saw was guys who want to play hockey with passion every shift, not guys who are afraid of making a mistake.
Andy Murray seems like a great guy, and the veteran leadership on the Blues is highly suspect. So there is no ill will and the dude had a lot to deal with.
But he seriously had a stopwatch on the bench during games, timing shifts, forcing guys to keep their shifts under 45 seconds. And one of the Blues’ worst problems under Murray was poorly timed line changes that led to odd man rushes. Now, under Payne, their average shift length is almost identical, but the players are encouraged to make smart shifts and go by feel. Sometimes this means a quick shift, other times this means staying out there to help establish pressure, etc. And it shows. They were tired against Anaheim, but they’ve looked like a completely different team in every other game. And not because of effort, but because they seem to have a different attitude and thought process. A different purpose.
That’s just one example of the kind of rigidity Murray seemed to crank up as problems arose. Sometimes that rigidity got results, other times it made a team that seemed dull, even when they were working hard. Great for short-term results, but it seems that as time goes on, enough new problems are going to get caught in that net and weigh the team down permanently.
Maybe Payne will turn out to be crap and Murray will go lead another team to a Cup. But I think even those who like Murray agree that a change was necessary.
“I hate to see that evening sun go down.” Ok, I’m actually looking forward to it: tomorrow’s Kings vs. Blues game.
Very true Sam. Although, its hard for me to really hold him accountable for the Kings coming up short in his last couple of years. No one could have overcome the amount of injuries he had to deal with… whether his coaching style had anything to do with the injuries is a completely different discussion.
But by the time he was on his way out, it sounded like the team had already tuned him out. Might be the same case in St. Louis…
One wonders if Murray is not so good with teams under pressure. The Kings with him at the helm always seemed better as an underdog.