All of this is old stuff. He did things how he saw them or learned them while himself was younger.
Worst thing he did was bully some people and mind games to get reactions to trigger players taking actions.
He was being tough on players. Most is storms in water glasses and some is pushing things too far or intentionally or unintentionally making mistakes.
Same as the thing in Columbus, just a dumb thing overall. He to my understanding was trying to learn more personal things about the players to connect with them and some took offense or didn't dare to say I'm not comfortable with it. Could have been solved different.
Not saying he was, but there is some exaggerations going on to his style. He wasn't just a tyrant 24/7 like certain people want to push as an agenda. Even Zetterberg and Lidstrom said he could be hard on people. Zetterberg said in some interview he also got into verbal fights with him at times.
Both also said they didn't notice the thing about Franzen so as prominent players and Swedish as well it wasn't as big thing as some people say. Now I'm not saying Franzen didn't perceive it as such at some point, but it seems it was some other factors involved as well enhancing it overall, as those others haven't really taken notice of it that it was more than with others.
Everyone said he could coach well.
But yeah, all agree that personal management skills there were some let's say wrong points of view on how he did things to try getting the results. On different occasions it was for sure the wrong way to go about it.
Tell that to Commodore, whose abuse by Babcock had nothing to do with his on ice play.
Babcock was a master at exploiting power dynamics. In most cases he’d isolate the players he most abused while he simultaneously sucked up to senior management and gained the trust of team leaders.
Sure Zetterberg and Lidstrom probably knew Babcock was a dick; but it doesnt suprise me they were unaware of the true nature of Franzen’s abuse. That’s exactly what Babcock would have wanted.
I also don't buy that Babcock is ‘old school’. Even Chris Chelios, who played for numerous tyrants, said Babcock was on a different level in terms of disrespecting people.
And therein lies the difference between Babcock and, say, Keenan or Bowman. The latter two played vicious mind games but everything was done for a hockey related purpose. Keenan and Bowman are generally regarded as very nice people away from the rink.
Babcock? He’d consistently **** people over, hockey and not hockey related, to feed his own ego.