Vegas Goes into WTF Mode, Fires Gallant and Hires DeBoer
There's a legendary story from the auto industry that seems eerily similar to what just happened with the Vegas Golden Knights.
The full story goes deeper, of course, but the signature moment of the story was company chairman Henry Ford II's unvarnished reply when company president Lee Iacocca asked why he was being fired even though his time there had been successful beyond expectations:
There's just something about you that pisses me off.
Golden Knights GM Kelly McCrimmon expressed only one real reason as to why he showed coach Gerard Gallant the door:
It’s hard to put into words, I guess, unless you’ve done these jobs, it’s more just the feeling that you have that a change might be needed.
Gallant musta sealed his own doom two seasons ago.
That's when he had a major role in assembling a collection of other teams' castoffs and making incisive trades that resulted in Vegas becoming the first expansion franchise in North American sports to play for the championship in its maiden cruise.
Being real, the Knights were barely on the outside looking in for a playoff spot in the mediocre Pacific Division. Dudes were also three points outta the division lead. With half a season to go, it isn't hard to like their chances.
Advanced metrics are showing strong performances in 5-on-5 play. They're among the lead leaders in shots, expected goal shares, and scoring chances. Their energy level's high, and they showed no signs of giving up on Gallant and his staff.
And the best McCrimmon can do is say he has a feel about these things.
Looking back, it's not hard to imagine a scenario where Vegas woulda made a repeat trip to the Stanley Cup Finals had it not been for a freakish penalty in Game 7 of last season's Western Conference championship series.
That game only turned up the heat even more on one of the league's most incendiary rivalries.
And now, look who McCrimmon picked outta the unemployment line to replace Gallant:
The San José Sharks cut Peter DeBoer loose in mid-December because they were scuffling. True, dude led them into the playoffs in each of his four seasons with them, but if any pro sport considers coaches interchangeable, it's hockey.
Gallant's canning was the league's seventh this season. That's an eye-rubbing 23% turnover, and there are still over two months to go.
The Sharks were going through a bad patch when DeBoer got fired, just as the Knights have been enduring now. However, name a team that doesn't hit a dry spell over a long campaign.
If Vegas has had a weak spot this season, it's along the blue line. Rhetorically speaking, who's supposed to find a way of dealing with that?
The general manager, maybe?
This isn't the first knock Gallant's taken in his coaching career. At least he wasn't literally kicked off the team bus and put out on the curb like he was when the Florida Panthers canned him.
No doubt, dude's gonna land on his feet. Maybe Seattle will come calling. Whether they want it or not, their expansion franchise will inevitably be compared to what Gallant did in the Knights' first season.
Who knows? It might just feel right.