In a spare moment in a summer spent stockpiling minds to fill out his hockey operations team, George McPhee spoke to theScore about his process since being appointed general manager of the NHL's incoming Las Vegas franchise. Here are a few additional notes from our conversation with the executive set to embark on an undertaking unlike anything previous in the NHL.
The upcoming expansion draft is captivating for a multitude of reasons. It's an event that directly impacts, and will exist as an ongoing subplot, for all teams. For Las Vegas, though, the process is simple, that is at least outwardly. The executives in Nevada won't have an expansion franchise to compete with. In fact, the expansion draft isn't a draft at all. All Vegas must do is treat each team as a separate entity, then select the exposed player that they determine most valuable based on their talent and existing contract. Right?
Well, McPhee explained that it won't be quite that simple.
McPhee: That would be the ideal, but it's probably going to be more complicated than that. There will be other variables involved like how much we have to spend, what we're required to spend, and what kind of contracts the players exposed have. Ideally, we'll pick the best players, and we'll get some good ones, but it's not going to be a simple process; it will be very complicated. And it will be a moving target right up until the night the lists are submitted.
In many respects, Nashville is Las Vegas' closest comparable market; a town with entertainment as its lifeblood. The Predators established roots predominantly on the basis of a solid on-ice product, but a single karaoke session at Tootsies gave us a glimpse of the sort of impact a gregarious, polarizing, larger-than-life athlete can have, and the interest they might be able to generate.
Will McPhee select his team with display space outside T-Mobile Arena in mind?
I'm not sure that it's all about having marketable players. It's about having a good team. If you have a good team and some of the players happen to bring star power, that's nice, that helps to sell the game. But we believe we're going to build a heck of a team, and it's going to be a very entertaining team. Our fans are going to enjoy coming to the rink every night.
In nearly two decades with Washington, McPhee toggled through multiple coaches with very different methodologies in an effort to bring out the most from the talented rosters he assembled, and which were never able to achieve the postseason success expected of them. Since his firing, the Caps turned to Barry Trotz, who has been lauded by many for the effect he's had on the roster, and especially Alex Ovechkin.
We asked McPhee about what he covets in his next coach.
The coach has to be an awful lot of things. They certainly have to understand the technical packages and everything else, but they have to be respected. The players will do what the coach asks them to do, but if they know why they're doing it, and they're doing it because they respect the coach, you get better results. We hope to find someone that has a lot of boxes we can check and becomes a terrific coach at the NHL level.
The uncertainly borne out of the expansion process continues to be in the back of the minds of the other 30 general managers as they spend, trade, draft, and sign. While Vegas isn't making similar transactions, it's very much in the dark as well. McPhee admitted his group hasn't even had the time to sort out what questions they still have for the NHL.
We'll (shift) focus on questions we have for the league, other operational issues. But we wanted to get our people out into the field first, and then turn our focus to those issues and things that we need to discuss.
Finally, McPhee submitted confidence that players and employees who come to be associated with the franchise will be as sold as he was.
When you get there and you see where the practices are going to be, and what a beautiful city Las Vegas is, an area that it is, the means of getting around, and the weather, it’s pretty clear that it’s a place people are going to want to work and want to play. And if we do our jobs, we can win.
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