A question for my fellow Blues fans most of you being far more knowledgeable about the game than I somewhat embarrassingly admit. I might have already asked Easton this before, but I don't remember if he responded...Anyway so here goes. I understand what makes a good coach during practice or at least how a good coach makes a difference in learning for sports I played in my younger days (football, baseball, track, golf, & boxing) and can see how that would more than likely hold true in hockey at the practice rink. But in a game so fluid and fast like hockey & similarly soccer/football how can you tell if a coach is good or not? I mean in American football the coach calls the plays from the sidelines, the skipper uses signals from the dugout, but players don't take their eyes off the ice to look for signals. How can you tell who's a good coach or bad coach in this game where players on the ice aren't receiving coaching as they are playing? What does Yeo do wrong that makes him a fairly consensus "bad coach" by both Wild & Blues fans?
There's a lot that goes into coaching, and a whole lot of it happens off the ice. Organizational skills, time management (both for staff and players), prioritizing, interpersonal skills, diagnosing problems (both on and off the ice) and solving them, game-planning, etc.
On the ice a coach is responsible (with the help of his staff) for juggling a lot of different things at once like governing specific match-ups, providing timely feedback to players, adjusting/tweaking things for better performance (whether lines, game-plan, exploiting tendencies, etc.), keeping players focused (in the moment and on task), etc.
Once the game starts, it's kind of like trying to influence a flood once a levy has been breached. There's a lot of chaos and a constant struggle to generate positive momentum. You can have an effect in real time but it generally won't be bigger than all the preparations you made prior to the breach. Mostly you're trying to get people where they need to be, plug holes as best you can, and keep the chaos at bay.
There are a lot of different possible styles, and more than one style can be successful. The thing is that most coaches have to work their way up to the NHL by taking the long path (coaching at lower levels and assistant coaching), so they develop their own styles that "work" for them and then refine them along the way. While coaches are constantly trying to adapt/tweak to gain an edge or improve, it's very rare to see someone completely discard a style that has brought them some extended measure of success to adopt a completely new and untested one at the NHL level where the stakes are highest and job security is most tenuous. It's just not natural for people to radically change like that under pressure.
Fans usually have their personal preferences for what type of coaching personality and philosophies they prefer, but IMO the "best" coaches are ones whose styles are well-matched to the strengths and weaknesses of the players on the roster, the current state of the game in general, and to the administrative staff they'll be working with. A coach who has very detailed and involved on-ice plans isn't going to have much success with players who can't absorb that level of detail or who are prone to paralysis by analysis, a coach that prefers an open style of play isn't going to be a great fit for a team of plodders and grinders, etc.
The spectrums aren't as black and white as I'm painting them to be for illustrative purposes, but a coach is far more likely to find success if his philosophies naturally complement the players at his disposal and the current state of the game than if the fit is a bit more forced.
A fan's analysis of a coach is naturally going to be pretty subjective affair based off (at best) incomplete information even if it's informed. For many, it might be as simple as a "good" coach is one that is winning and a "bad" coach is one that isn't. Perhaps a bit simplistic and results oriented, but not necessarily wrong. At the end of the day that's probably what matters most to their employers, and a lot of good coaches have been fired because they weren't winning. A good coach that's a bad fit can certainly be a "bad" coach for a specific situation.
There's room for more nuanced evaluations as well, and a lot of those will focus on things like how well he seems to be leading the team, how well the team seems to adapt to and overcome adversity, how well the team's style holds up against other teams, how consistently the team plays from night to night, how organized the team is on the ice, whether the team is generally over/under-performing, etc. All are usually based off inferential observations and semi-informed speculations in the short term, but over time patterns can be regular enough that they can become solid evidence.
I don't want to speak for anyone else with regards to Yeo, but I think there are some valid criticisms out there about him. With regards to his fit for this roster...well, the roster has changed an awful lot in the last couple of weeks, with more possibly to come at training camp, so perhaps it is time to reevaluate some of those opinions as the previous ones might be a bit outdated.