Oilers hire Stan Bowman as GM & EVP of Hockey Ops

[HighLifeManIsHigh]

It's not like he was even a phenomenal GM.

His track record in trades is abysmal, his drafting is mediocre, and he handed out some truly horrific contracts.

Everything important and worthwhile on the Hawks was acquired by someone else.

The abuser enabling is the shit-cherry on top of the shit-sundae

Nice shit analogy, Rand

 

[Fatass]

Three Cups with the Hawks.

 

[Sega Dreamcast]

Could he have done more yes, but he didn’t, he made a mistake a human mistake, for which the NHL punished him for.

Is it not an established fact that the purpose of the cover-up was to avoid distracting the team during the playoffs?

That's not "a human mistake", that's a calculated decision.

 

[67 others]

Nicole Brown stuff aside, OJ Simpson was a hell of a running back.

That comparison would work if the oilers hired Brad Aldrich

 

[Haatley]

Sure, assuming he had full details about the incident and had more power than the president of his hockey organization that he escalated the concern to.


Suggesting we hunt him down and remove this filth from this world?

Imagine being the only person defending a guy who allowed a young kid to get sexually abused under his watch cause a person under him told him to keep quiet cause it's the playoffs.

 

[Mr Positive]

That's great, but it's what any half decent person would do. That said it's also what anyone with no remorse also would do if they have even the slightest sense of good PR.

Put it this way, let's say another ethical quandary pops up for him, not necessarily of the exact same nature, but also a choice between what's right, vs what's good for his team. Years later it comes out that he made the wrong choice again. Would you be absolutely gobsmacked and stunned, or merely disappointed or even unsurprised? IMO, unless it's #1, you can't support this in any way.

It would be far less likely for this scandal to happen again under Bowman than for any other GM in the league. The evil he was guilty of was an evil of ignorance. He never ordered for Ulritch's crimes to be denied and covered up. He ordered for that issue to be kicked down to the future, and responsibility passed down to underlings until it was forgotten. Every step of the way, he was wilfully ignorant of exactly what happened. This can happen to anyone who is laser focused on the Stanley Cup.

These evils can easily happen again but it's not going to happen to Bowman again. No one is more educated on this now. He learned the hard way. He's seen how this can happen first hand

 

[Doomhammer]

That's the same logic as saying criminals who go to jail are less likely to commit a crime again because they saw what happens.

My thought is opposite, it happened because he didn't have enough leadership skills to understand what was going on. Based on the press conference he still does not seem to be someone that radiates leadership qualities.

 

[JPT]

It would be far less likely for this scandal to happen again under Bowman than for any other GM in the league. The evil he was guilty of was an evil of ignorance. He never ordered for Ulritch's crimes to be denied and covered up. He ordered for that issue to be kicked down to the future, and responsibility passed down to underlings until it was forgotten. Every step of the way, he was wilfully ignorant of exactly what happened. This can happen to anyone who is laser focused on the Stanley Cup.

These evils can easily happen again but it's not going to happen to Bowman again. No one is more educated on this now. He learned the hard way. He's seen how this can happen first hand

Being "laser focused on the Stanley Cup" is another way of saying selfishness got in the way of doing the right thing.

That's the same logic as saying criminals who go to jail are less likely to commit a crime again because they saw what happens.

My thought is opposite, it happened because he didn't have enough leadership skills to understand what was going on. Based on the press conference he still does not seem to be someone that radiates leadership qualities.

Not to mention his punishment was only a few years off and a job immediately upon being reinstated.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

Until it was forgotten? We’re not talking about an exec that forgot some minor thing of little consequence or a slip of the mind kind of thing. We’re talking about the head of hockey ops of a billion dollar franchise that willingly chose to ignore a sexual assault by one of his employees against another of his employees, the consequence of which lead to the victim more or less dropping out of hockey relevancy (maybe due to the after effects of the assault, maybe not) and the abuser moving on to a freaking school to abuse again. The end result of all of which being pretty inarguably the single biggest NHL-related scandal of the past generation and the victimization of a literal minor.

There is so damn much wrong with what Bowman did that there’s really no moral defense to give the guy another GM gig basically immediately upon being eligible to be hired as such.

Not to mention that Bowman’s prime, moralities aside as much as I hate to use that phrase, was in a period with much more cap crunching potential than exists now, so even purely on a hockey ops side of thing this doesn’t seem like the kind of thing that’d move the needle much for Edmonton positively, and with his baggage has to be a distraction for Edmonton.

Q can still coach damn well, so if you want to make a moralities aside argument to hire anyone, at least he brings tangible positives in today’s hockey world. Bowman? He can’t sign a player to a Keith- or Hossa-like contract any more. Hs draft evaluation has been suspect for years. His trade capabilities have been lackluster minus the one good move he did screwing over Edmonton his last few years. What does he bring to the table other than a legacy name and success a decade removed from reality?

 

[JPT]

Any time I have any sort of issue that falls outside managing my department logistics, I do the same. Bring it to my boss and Human resources, who are paid to take care of the more uncommon human rights issues, and step back from it. My part is done.

They may or may not tell me how it was resolved, but often don't due to "confidentiality "

If Bowman had followed up to make sure something was being done and was told that the actions taken by HR (actions is a strong word to use in this case) were confidential, I could almost, almost, give him the benefit of the doubt. I've read nothing about that happening. The only person who seems to have followed up was Jim Gary, who followed up with Bowman and was assured it was being handled. A person with any sense of morality would have followed up, and, if they caught wind of the "participate in an investigation or resign" offer made to Aldrich, would have gone to the media, resigned, or both.

Bowman had nothing to lose by taking a principled stand. He would have surely been hired elsewhere if he decided to resign. If he had pressed the issue within the organization, chances are good that his clout would have been enough to force an investigation, particularly if he threatened to go public about the team's half-assed handling of serious criminal allegations.

He didn't do anything, though. He was more than happy to wash his hands of it and expected nothing to come back on him. He is sorry because he was caught in the act of doing nothing and had to leave the NHL for a little while. His selfishness is apparent. His tears are crocodile tears.

Yeah hindsight is 20/20 and all that, but that's why anyone of character tries to do the obvious right thing instead of passing the buck.

And if Q actually did say something about not letting this distract from their Cup run it just makes everything that much worse.

 

[Skolman]

Well, it could be worse. Like if he fires Knobby and brings Quenneville.

Not that I want Knoblauch gone, but at least Quenneville has a long track record of success.

I don't believe Quenneville is a bad coach, but I do believe Bowman is a bad GM.

 

[PaulD]

I mean just because the NHL deemed it sufficient doesn't mean people arent allowed to believe that letting sexual abuse on your watch and doing nothing to rectify it is wrong and a couple years away isn't the remedy. He shouldn't have been allowed back, period.

Some people take sexual abuse more seriously than others, so reactions will vary as seen in this thread.

If some think the NHL went to easy on the ex Chicago Black Hawk employees. Wonder what their take was on MLG and the massive lengthy management cover up that lingered on in Toronto.
Fletcher never missed a day'.

 

[JPT]

If some think the NHL went to easy on the ex Chicago Black Hawk employees. Wonder what their take was on MLG and the massive lengthy management cover up that lingered on in Toronto.
Fletcher never missed a day'.

That's worse, but the NHL clearly learned no lessons and went too easy on the Blackhawks' crew.

 

[Bowski]

Welcome to the club Stan!

We all make "stupid f***ing mistakes man"™, but get right back on the horse.

Sincerely your pals,

 

[Frank Drebin]

Welcome to the club Stan!

We all make "stupid f***ing mistakes man"™, but get right back on the horse.

Sincerely your pals,

Who is the second guy

 

[SannywithoutCompy]

Not a good time to go to that sort of commentary.

Yeah that was before this all happened

 

[Mobiandi]

McDavid is the #1 player in the world. He's a legend in the making.

How hard would it be for him to ask ownership to stop hiring creeps? It certainly would be easier than it was for Bergeron.

McDavid and Drai are just running down their contracts. They couldn't care less what happens to the Oilers

 

[TheMoreYouKnow]

I don't know if Stan Bowman is a good GM. On paper he's had a lot of success, more than 99% of GMs, which is probably what people in the decision-making roles are looking at.

I also do strongly suspect that behind closed doors the majority of people in the hockey industry have a rather different take on the sex scandal than vocal fans on social media. One they will never share with the public, but are pretty confident about in private.

Now for me the question is if the Oilers are prepared for the fact that they will get some heat for this hiring from the media. It always surprises me when organizations make obvious controversial moves and then appear to be blindsided by the fact that there's blowback from the media. It's like, don't these teams have PR departments? If they get through the initial negativity, people will move on and by mid-season it's basically forgotten by most, but that's a big 'if'.

 

[67 others]

If Bowman had followed up to make sure something was being done and was told that the actions taken by HR (actions is a strong word to use in this case) were confidential, I could almost, almost, give him the benefit of the doubt. I've read nothing about that happening. The only person who seems to have followed up was Jim Gary, who followed up with Bowman and was assured it was being handled. A person with any sense of morality would have followed up, and, if they caught wind of the "participate in an investigation or resign" offer made to Aldrich, would have gone to the media, resigned, or both.

Bowman had nothing to lose by taking a principled stand. He would have surely been hired elsewhere if he decided to resign. If he had pressed the issue within the organization, chances are good that his clout would have been enough to force an investigation, particularly if he threatened to go public about the team's half-assed handling of serious criminal allegations.

He didn't do anything, though. He was more than happy to wash his hands of it and expected nothing to come back on him. He is sorry because he was caught in the act of doing nothing and had to leave the NHL for a little while. His selfishness is apparent. His tears are crocodile tears.

Yeah hindsight is 20/20 and all that, but that's why anyone of character tries to do the obvious right thing instead of passing the buck.

And if Q actually did say something about not letting this distract from their Cup run it just makes everything that much worse.

*shrugs
I don't follow up at all. When i am in thoae situations, i let the people paid to handle those situations handle it. Once I've passed the little information I was given to my superior and HR, I'm out of it, don't even sit in on the meetings and all I want to know is the outcome.

If they say we gave an employee the option to resign and he did, I can only assume HR investigated and I ask no questions. Its on them to call the authorities, not me, if they feel that is needed. HR is trained in those scenarios and legalities and i am not. The ball isn't in my court at that point unless I want to argue to keep an employee.

But then again I am just a department manager, not a GM or CEO. I am allowed to do exactly what they tell me to when it comes to that stuff. It's right in our policies to let HR know immediately so they can handle it and step away and keep anything I know confidential and say "it's being handle by HR" when queried and do nothing more

 

[lawrence]

Holy shit oiler fans on Reddit pissed as hell. Some were like ready to become flames fans.

wtf is going on here.

 

[Channelcat]

Good hire.

 

[FiveTacos]

HR is trained in those scenarios and legalities and i am not. The ball isn't in my court at that point unless I want to argue to keep an employee.

But then again I am just a department manager, not a GM or CEO.

Thing with HR that you learn as you get older, is that they work for the boss too. And their job is more often than not to protect the ass of the company, first and foremost, not the employees. We hear story after story in the news of someone reporting something to HR and having nothing happen or even having it come back to bite them.

OTOH a GM is supposed to be one of the few people who can actually make sure HR does do its job. An NHL GM wields tremendous power and influence. This isn't a mid level employee who should be scared to rock the boat.

It would be far less likely for this scandal to happen again under Bowman than for any other GM in the league.

That's like saying a cop who covered for his dirty partner once and got busted and fired is less likely to do it again if he's hired by another town.

The evil he was guilty of was an evil of ignorance. He never ordered for Ulritch's crimes to be denied and covered up. He ordered for that issue to be kicked down to the future, and responsibility passed down to underlings until it was forgotten. Every step of the way, he was wilfully ignorant of exactly what happened. This can happen to anyone who is laser focused on the Stanley Cup.

If you're so laser focused on the Cup that you'd forget all about something like that , then sorry to say .... You are a terrible F'ing person with with terrible F'ing priorities in life, and that's not likely to change no matter how nice you play in front of the cameras.

A GM is usually the 1st or 2nd most powerful person in the organization, if he told them to kick the can, guess what message that tells everyone he passed the buck to? It means we don't want to deal with this, make it go away, and I've been around enough corporate to know it is in fact code for "bury it".

 

[Canovin]

Who is the second guy

It's Bowski

Holy shit oiler fans on Reddit pissed as hell. Some were like ready to become flames fans.

wtf is going on here.

Fans on Reddit are ex-Hfboard members. Makes sense they can't keep their lit together

 

[Mr Positive]

Being "laser focused on the Stanley Cup" is another way of saying selfishness got in the way of doing the right thing.

But his evil was to not pay attention enough. It's not like he held these two truths in equal regard, that there was sexually inappropriate stuff from Ulritch, and that they wanted to win the cup. They delegated the sexual assault concern to an underling who swept it under the rug that summer. Bowman and others were guilty of simply not following up, which was also the lazy thing. Ulrich was gone so he assumed it was dealt with. It doesn't seem like there was malice there.

It is not a stretch to assume that if even a hint of this kind of thing happens on the Oilers, that Bowman will be the one freaking out about it the most.

 

[thegazelle]

If he's learned from his mistakes and is a changed man then that's great. But actions (or inactions) still should have consequences. He shouldn't get to jump back into a GM position in this league. This reflects very poorly on Edmonton.

Totally agree. Part of accepting consequences is rebuilding trust, and one cannot really be trusted to do that if they were immediately installed in a position of authority from which they can potentially abuse that trust. Better that he humbly re-enter the league in a much lesser capacity to be under the direct supervision of a GM, and for which his authority and powers are curtailed. He could have been a scout, maybe even work in hockey ops behind the scenes, to show that he has changed. I think thrusting him back into a very high leadership role is the wrong move by the Oilers, and I am saying this as a lifelong Oilers fan.