Best available means, you encompass EVERYONE................you do not omit people, which is what the Habs do.
Do these make good choices all the time, of course not. But they do not leave people off their lists, because of language, like the Habs do, and it is NOT working.
Recycling old coaches has produced ZERO results.
First question to ask is pretty simple: How many teams would hire that guy today?
I look at Therrien after Pittsburgh….nobody would hire him before the Habs did and nobody wants to touch him since them. That should tell everyone that this choices was more based on politics than competence. Not ready to say same thing about Julien though. Other team would have hired him.
Bergevin? Same thing. No one in their right mind would have consider him for the GM job in the NHL. Politic choice, not based on competence.
In some case it might work, but most of the time, if not always…. it doesn't work.
This is where you can see when the Habs makes a decision more based on politics, no matter who's on their list.
Nobody would've hire Houle, Gauthier or Savard as a GM, Tremblay or Carbonneau as coaches either.
When i hear the names of Bouchard, Ducharme, Roy or the bunch in the Q.....if no one else would consider them for a job, then why should we? The only answer to this is Politics and surely not competence cause other team would have made some calls.