Arace: Mike Babcock resignation another PR dumpster fire for Columbus Blue Jackets
The Blue Jackets staged their annual preseason media day Monday, not 24 hours after they fired their coach, Mike Babcock, in what was a public relations dumpster fire. Check that. They didn’t fire Babcock. According to John Davidson, president of hockey operations, they decided "there was no going back and the resignation went forward.”
Babcock had a two-year contract worth $8 million. When asked whether there were legal grounds to terminate the contract, Davidson said, “We’ve had discussions, we’ve come to an agreement, and we’ll leave it at that. Thank you.”
A few thoughts, beginning with this one, from a former sports writer who used to cover the Jackets: “Blow it up. Fire them all. Sell the team.”
That’s eight syllables away from a perfect Haiku.
A former goaltender also texted with verse, of a kind: “Blue Jackets ... Babsack ... Doug (MacLean) has a book out on how to draft (eyeroll emoji) ... one of two teams never to make a conference final. … Boomer. … etc …”
People will never forget Boomer, the second mascot for a hot minute. He was a cannon, or a bong, or something else. But he was definitely masculine. And when his visage is being conjured 13 years after he was mothballed, it’s because the team has sustained yet another black eye.
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“Blow it up. Fire them all. Sell the team.” It’s a longstanding meme, like “Jeff Carter.”
Babcock was hired July 1. His tenure came to an abrupt end three days before the start of training camp. It was precipitated by an investigation of the NHL Players’ Association, which found that Babcock had crossed personal boundaries when he asked players to show him their iPhone photos.
Given Babcock’s reputation – accusations of verbal bullying and psychological intimidation have been flying hither and yon since he was fired by the Toronto Maple Leafs nearly four years ago – no one was surprised that he made a major mess of things in Columbus before he even stepped behind the bench. Check that. Davidson and Kekalainen were surprised. They hired him, after all.
An hour before Davidson and Kekalainen sat for their press conference, there was a “Statement from Columbus Blue Jackets ownership group” that said, in part:
“We had candid conversations with our leadership group after last season about our goals and expectations for growth and progress on the ice in 2023-24. Those expectations are still in place and can still be achieved, so we do not anticipate further changes to our hockey leadership team at this time.”
That last clause – “we do not anticipate further changes to our hockey leadership team at this time” − is a loaded one, especially the last three words. It was aimed at heading off any questions about whether Kekalainen would survive iPhonegate. It was also a public pronouncement that Kekalainen and Davidson can ill afford another misstep, even if it’s not quite a PR dumpster fire.
Kekalainen attempted to defend the decision to hire Babcock (“It’s obviously fair to question our due diligence, but I can assure you it was done thoroughly”). He also defended Babcock to some degree (“I do not believe there were any ill intentions on Mike’s part”).
Neither Kekalainen nor Davidson admitted to knowing the full extent of what the NHLPA investigation revealed.
“Sometimes, when things happen, there are players involved, and it’s a private world, and sometimes you need to leave it there,” Davidson said. “But I do know there were things that happened and it has led to the point where we’re at right now.”
Despite this soft-shoeing around the details, both Kekalainen and Davidson were explicit in their mea culpas.
Davidson: “We got it wrong, and that’s on us … We understand the criticism and it is deserved. We understand the expectations of ownership, and we will continue to be evaluated every day. That's part of the job.”
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Asked what he’d say to critics who questioned the hiring of Babcock in the first place, Davidson said, “Maybe they were right.”
Kekalainen: “At the end of the day, I believed Mike Babcock deserved another opportunity to coach. Obviously, that was a mistake, and that responsibility was mine.”
Marty Walsh, a former U.S. Secretary of Labor, took the helm of the NHLPA in February. He faced his first crisis and handled it with aplomb. Walsh and the union are the only parties that come out looking good. They have established that players can and should be heard when there is something amiss in the workplace environment.
Babcock’s behavior was beyond the pale. If not for the union investigation, it may be that nobody would have known the extent of his transgressions, that the team’s original “there’s nothing to see here” stance would have held, and that Babcock would have spread more poison throughout the Jackets’ locker room.
“Our players deserved to be treated with respect in the workplace,” Walsh said. “The club’s decision to move forward with a new head coach is the appropriate course of action.”
Amen to that. The best part of Monday’s confab was the new coach, Pascal Vincent, who was given a two-year contract. Maybe fans know him only by reputation as an up-and-coming coach who has paid his dues and is ready for his first big job. What fans got to see Monday was hope.
I detect a little Wilfried Nancy in Vincent, and that is a high compliment.
“It has been a hard few days,” Vincent said. “Then it settles in. And then my focus is, OK, what do we do? … The players, I know them. They deserve for the coaches to be ready for training camp. And we will be ready.”
Last word to ex-goalie texter:
“I’d love to see that market with a sustainable elite team. It would be awesome.”
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Mike Babcock mess another dumpster fire for Columbus Blue Jackets
