Blues Fire Davis Payne...Hire Ken Hitchcock

[brynec]

Could this be coming from new ownership, maybe Hulsizer didn't like Payne and wanted someone else coaching and with it happening now if it doesn't work it's not his idea. But I find it hard to believe he didn't have any input in this decision.

[theohall]

This is an excellent Yahoo! article discussing reasons.

A few immediate reactions:

• Hitchcock goes way back with Armstrong, who was an assistant GM with the Dallas Stars when Hitchcock was their head coach from 1995-2002. (He was also a front office guy for Team Canada in the 2010 Winter Games, where Hitch was an associate coach.) Columbus GM Scott Howson, in contrast, fired Hitchcock 59 games after the coach led the Blue Jackets to the playoffs for the first and only time in franchise history. Guess where Hitchcock decided to coach?

• The Blues are 6-7-0 for 12 points. The Blue Jackets are 2-11-1 for 5 points. Take a look at the St. Louis roster. Take a look at the Columbus roster. The blue line alone would make St. Louis the more attractive job, with the potential to contend for a playoff spot rather than shepherding a prolonged rebuild with a goaltender whose as solid as vanilla pudding. (Keeping in mind, of course, that Hitchcock's fuse burns quickly in new gigs.)

• As for the Blues, they couldn't handle Andy Murray's drill sergeant routine, so the team flipped him for players' coach Payne and handed the keys to the locker room over to a young generation of talent with no adult supervision. Said TJ Oshie to FanHouse in Sept. 2010: "I think we're more relaxed with Payne. He's a younger guy, maybe a bit of a players' coach. He lets us play our own game."

That lasted one season. In came Jason Arnott(notes) and Jamie Langenbrunner(notes) for veteran leadership, and out went Payne for Hitchcock, a coach very much in the disciplinarian mold. (Langenbrunner played for Hitch in Dallas, incidentally.)
Hitchcock is, frankly, exactly what this team needs after meandering with a players' coach for parts of two years. Structure. Discipline. Consistency. Improved special teams. OK, it's going to be boring. Hitchcock's teams usually are. But you know what boring gets you? Strong performances from perennial underachievers, and teams that make the playoffs more often than once in six seasons.

• Why now, when the Blues hadn't bottomed out? Just speculating, but maybe Hitch had a decision to make about his future with regard to the Blue Jackets and the Blues. So the trigger was pulled before the Blues were in a position where Payne's dismissal was obvious. The bottom line is, apparently, the management felt Hitchcock was better suited to bring this team to success than Payne.

• As for the Blue Jackets … well, the assumption was that Hitchcock would slide in behind the bench with one more year on his contract with the team. Scott Arniel remains the coach, and doesn't have any meetings with Jackets brass scheduled. As he told Puck-Rakers: "I'll keep showing up until somebody tells me I'm not supposed to."

Other than his contract, there never seemed to be a compelling reason for Hitchcock to take over the disaster that are the 2011-12 Columbus Blue Jackets. So he didn't.

[philco_3]

Not too excited about the retread of Hitchcock, but oh...it's the Blues, I'm used to changes.

Just did the math...The Blues head coaches last an average of less than every 2 years.

[gaijin]

Wow. This seems to have come out of nowhere. Not exactly a great start to the season, but not terrible either. Other issues involved than just a history between Armstrong and Hitchcock?

Weird.

[cardsfan04]

I didn't see it coming, but it kind of makes sense in hindsight.

-Blues were underachieving. Not to the point of expecting a coaching change, but underachieving nonetheless. If they didn't think Payne could get things turned around, better to do it now rather than later.

-Payne wasn't hired by Armstrong (although Armstrong was with the Blues when Payne was promoted from Peoria). Hitchcock and Armstrong worked together in Dallas, winning the cup together in '99.

-New owner taking over. Might want to put his own stamp on the team. Like somebody said, Hulsizer clearly had input on this decision.

[WaukeeBlues]

I don't agree with it. I'm a little bit shocked but honestly, with the turnover of coaches in professional sports anymore, nothing is surprising to a point. Blues getting a new coach almost every two years? Yea you want to talk about consistency that CAN'T be good for the younger guys on the team adapting to a new system every 1.75 seasons.

There had to be some backroom shenanigans going on with this, there just had to be. The Blues are maybe underperforming to start the year but they're not terrible or anything. If we were more along the lines of the BJ's record I could understand it but I can't say I agree with this. But what do I know.

[cprice12]

Wow. This came out of left field a bit.
I was off the grid from after 3pm today. I DVR'd the Rams game and didn't want to catch updates. Just found out about Payne getting canned.

Seemed like a quick trigger...but it is what it is. I liked Payne, but hell...they weren't playing as expected.
One has to wonder if Halak hadn't sucked and we had a few more wins, does Payne get fired? No...he wouldn't have.

I think it's as simple as our special teams are horrible...I mean really bad, and we're off to a sub-par start. Special teams issues are easy to pin on coaching.

I don't like Ken Hitchcock... but he is an experienced coach who has a cup. If this team starts winning under him, then I'll gladly jump on his bandwagon.

It will be very interesting to see how the team responds to this.
Cue the players verbally taking the blame and saying how great a guy Payne was and how if they had played better he'd still be coach...yadda, yadda.

Hopefully Payne getting fired reminds the players that nobody is safe. If you don't perform up to expectations, your job may be in jeopardy.


Oh...and we tape the podcast on Monday night this week...so we're good.

[cardsfan04]

Several people have said they don't like Hitchcock. I don't know enough about in game hockey strategy to form intelligent opinions about one coach from another, but I know he has had success as a coach. Why do some of you guys not like him?

[theohall]

While people don't seem to like Hitchcock, he is in the Bowman mold in that it's his way or you sit. And he does it to everyone, not just kids. All Hitchcock does is have winning seasons and coach playoff teams, or so it seems. Heck, he had Columbus in the playoffs one season.

While Halak hasn't been sharp, were the Blues special teams better, they might have won games in spite of Halak not being sharp. Who knows?

Heck, how many PPGs did the Oilers score and what was the final?? 4-2 with 2 PPGA. Not to mention the Wild game.

Something needed to change with the way the PP and PK were not working and the Blues do not have what one would consider significant enough injuries to justify the poor special teams performance.

This isn't getting Halak off the hook, yet. But we shall see what happens if the team gets better on those special teams.

[Oaklandblue]

I think we're about to see some changes, on the quick. The problem with coaching might have been that Payne didn't lean on his staff hard enough, but when you got people like Hirsch as your Netminding Coach? Nuff said.

I'm hoping Hitch revamps the PP and special teams before deciding to ditch Halak or not. On that note I'm hoping they don't name anyone as -the- starter, but start Elliott more. You see a much different team when Ell's between the pipes.

[Nyghtewynd]

Yeah, still not calm. Absolutely horrific decision, and one that has the possibility of setting the franchise back five years. Hitch plays stupid-boring hockey and doesn't like young kids. So we have the distinct possibility of being terrible to watch, and having Oshie/Petro/etc revolt. Ridiculous decision. Davis really got screwed here. I didn't feel bad for Murray, but I feel bad for Davis.

[theohall]

Yeah, still not calm. Absolutely horrific decision, and one that has the possibility of setting the franchise back five years. Hitch plays stupid-boring hockey and doesn't like young kids. So we have the distinct possibility of being terrible to watch, and having Oshie/Petro/etc revolt. Ridiculous decision. Davis really got screwed here. I didn't feel bad for Murray, but I feel bad for Davis.

Hitchcock coached Pietrangelo last season in the World Championships and called him the next Lidstrom, so I doubt we have to worry about Petro revolting.

[Winning Unlimited]

Quenneville >> Kitchen >> Murray >> Payne >> Hitchcock

[sseagle]

He better be able to beat the Blackhawks....

[dmiles2186]

Murray, Payne and Hitch all made their Blues coaching debuts against the 'Hawks. So if you are looking to see when the next firing is going to, find a Blackhawks game on the schedule.

I read on Twitter that Hulsizer didn't make this decision. My original thought was that he did or wanted his guy in there. But from what I read, Hulsizer was aware that the 'hockey guys' were talking about this and left the decision up to them.

Will be an interesting day.

By the way, no one's posted them yet, I don't think. JR got in touch with Payne last night. Here's the quote:

"It's shocking and it's disappointing, but in the end, you're responsible for all the areas of your hockey team," he said. "There were pieces that weren't firing on all cylinders and it's under my umbrella of responsibility. But I also can say that we were looking at a favorable schedule ahead and ready to turn the corner. That said, if this is what gets things going, then I'm all for it. I wish nothing but the best for the team and this group of guys. They deserve it.

"I'm more than grateful, more than grateful, to this organization for giving me a chance to coach in this league. The things that I learned and will learn from this, I owe a great deal of thanks."

Read more: http://www.stltoday.com/sports/hockey/p ... z1d1cPyy1Q

[STLADOGG]

Went from the House of Payne, to the House of Cock.

[gaijin]

From:




To:

[DaDitka]

Well, I'm sure there more back story then we know at this point, but it sounds as though the basic issue was that Payne was too soft on the guys (funny, cause Murray was too tough...anyways....) I'm not going to pretend for one second that I have any idea how the Hitchcock hiring is going to work out with the make up of this team, however....I know both JR and Strickland had mentioned in the offseason that Payne's job was in jeopardy and I didn't see anything so far this season to change that situation (at least not towards the good).

It sounds as though the organization really likes Payne, they just didn't think he's the right man to lead the troops at the NHL level. Hitchcock was a guy they were considering and it sound as though they may have had to pounce now, or miss out.

And while I understand what everyone is saying about too much change (which I don't agree with, both Pittsburgh and (I believe) New Jersey have made deep runs after mid season changes recently), but hiring Hitchcock this early gives you more of an ample sample size at the end of the season to decide if this is a direction you want to continue next year.

[DaDitka]

Happiest guy about Ken Hitchcock’s hire in St. Louis? Jaroslav Halak

Joe Yerdon Nov 7, 2011, 8:55 AM EST
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If there’s anyone in St. Louis that could be happy about seeing Ken Hitchcock taking over for the fired Davis Payne, it should be Jaroslav Halak.

Halak’s tenure in St. Louis since arriving in a trade with Montreal before last season has been a roller coaster of emotion. Last season saw Halak play hot and cold like a little kid playing with the sink faucets. Going from stellar opponent-frustrating games that saw him stop everything under the sun to ones where he couldn’t stop a beach ball was how things went.

So far this season, the beach ball has been winning more often than not as Halak’s numbers have ballooned and Brian Elliott has become the de facto starter for the Blues. If the Blues are going to be a playoff team in the West, they cannot have things going like that.

With Hitchcock in place now, the Blues are going to become a tougher defensive team come hell or high water (or trades). That kind of change in action should favor Halak who thrived behind a defensive system in Montreal.

While the initial go of things could be tough while the team figures out his system and learns a new meaning of pain under Hitchcock, the end result should see Halak’s numbers come back down and allow Halak to find a comfort zone in goal. ESPN’s Craig Custance tweeted last night that any players not buying into Hitchcock’s way of doing things will find themselves shipped out of town and the last guy we’ll see on that list should be Halak.

While St. Louis fans might not have those Halak “STOP” signs ready right now, they might want to shine them up for future games.

@CraigCustance
Craig Custance
Spoke with someone who thinks Armstrong/Hitchcock will trade anyone who doesn't buy in: "You're going to see guys moved out of there."

[KPFBlue]

This has to be the result of the new suits. If so, I can understand that. It's just business.

If not, this makes no sense. At some point we have to stop blaming the coaches, perhaps the product isn't that good.