Steve Kournianos talked about her lack of professionalism, and people from twitter called him sexist immidietly.
That`s really fun that in modern hockey scouting we can find our own liberal\idealistic and conservative\realistic vision. And how it manifests itself in the assessment of what is happening on the ice, how everyone presents themselves and their attitude to hockey and to the players, how they respond to criticism, etc. It is especially interesting to observe this from the outside, when you immerse yourself deeply enough in the culture of the country, but at the same time you are an outside observer. How this or that (all the same) conflict manifests itself in the hockey plane.
In this case, I like Steve`s side more. Because it`s about Luke Hughes for the beggining.
I consider Steve a friend of sorts, but I sometimes wish he'd go a bit more diplomatic in his Twitter debates. I also appreciate his fire and consider him the best at what he does in the business, I just don't see the point in arguing with people and letting those arguments get personal.
Perhaps ironically, I'm also good friends with a Dobber writer (Ian Gooding) and often correspond with the best Dobber/EP scout (by a mile) in Cam Robinson. Cam and Steve are certainly on opposite sides of this, ah...
debate.
In the initial stages of this "kerfuffle", Steve was certainly in the right. Lauren Kelly literally had an awful. awful and almost slanderous take on Luke Hughes, offering no tactical argument to back it. This was also suspicious in that Ms. Kelly is good friends with Rachel Doerrie -- who was (rightfully) lambasted for her even stupider commentary on the same Luke Hughes.
Now, as someone who follows
all of these people, I have to say that usually, Ms. Kelly is very good at her job. Ms. Doerrie, however, is completely incompetent. She's not only lost every job in hockey she's ever had, she burned multiple bridges at every stop with her outrageously inane takes on virtually everything and refusal to admit to any mistake in judgement, ever ever ever. Doerrie generally suffers from the selfsame insufferableness as Byron Bader, which is to say she brags incessantly about any small success and refuses to take accountability for cataclysmic errors in judgement.
Regardless, Ms. Kelly made a big mistake in her tweet, and whether or not the reasoning was connected to Doerrie is purely speculative, I admit, though it seems the only possible justification of such an awful take.
Steve Kournianos called Kelly out on her error, although, as Mr. Kournianos often does, his response lacked a certain diplomacy many in the hockey journalism world would prefer. The problem is that Kournianos simply called Kelly out for a poor take, and many defending Kelly decried Steve's criticism as "sexism" even though it was the polar opposite -- Kournianos just ripped Kelly in the same way he would rip any male prospect-writer for saying something he found idiotic.
I followed the entire argument, which often became heated, but of course I stayed out of it. Ultimately, my opinion remains unchanged that Steve Kournianos is the best prospect analyst in the business, while Lauren Kelly I still consider to be pretty good (generally) too -- although she needs to learn to keep personal bias out of her analysis. This is the primary sin, after all, of the weak prospect writer -- not being willing to take accountability and learn from your mistakes because you're too thin-skinned. It's why Corey Pronman consistently writes articles detailing the picks he missed on and why, and why he's so good, and conversely it's why Byron Bader is pretty much the joke of the prospect/draft-writing world.
