People give Bergevin and friends shit all the time for how poorly they handled Chucky, and others.
I don't know about Galchenyuk case, but at some point, it's not your employer business/responsibility if you're messing up in your private life. These players are adults and accountable for their actions.
It was reported Hughes had serious discussions with Cheveldayoff regarding Dubois last year. There was absolutely no reason for him to offer any more than he did then. I get the impression that both prongs of the demand were an issue for us.
Technically they did insulate these kids... with alleged coke heads like Prusty
When you're drafting an 18 year old kid - yeah they're kids even at 18 - 3OA and investing all that money and hope in him, it's IDIOTIC to not protect your investment and insulate him for the first couple of years until they're more mature emotionally and mentally.
MB said that if you want to improve as a player, that's on you. Didn't even have a development coach, as I recall, or if they did, he didn't have much to do. Whereas, Chris Nicholas seems to have a huge role, as he should.
FWIW He's one of the handful of players who's statement is not an outright denial but rather a wilingness to help the investigation along as much as possible. Not that anyone who was compromised wouldn't outright lie thinking the fix was in.
But how to do that? Do you force these guys into your plan? The player himself have a lot more to lose than the team. Some of these young guys are just going to act like they don't need advice (like young people do).
As long as they keep him far away from a camera or a microphone, he will do fine as an assistant.
There is a difference between hiring someone to do a desk job vs investing a draft pick into a player that may drive your team to championships. Also you are giving millions of dollars to such a kid, 18 y.o.... remember what you were at 18 and imagine yourself suddenly be a millionnaire..... I think it would make a lot of sense to invest a bity into protecting that investment, don't you think?
In the case of AG it's not an if anymore. There was and still is out of ice issues. That was his main problem. He never was going to be a star but he easily had the skills to be a 30/60 player. I don't consider him a bad pick personally. It was one of the weakest draft ever and it's hard to predict out of ice issues.
Most employers actually do try to prevent that. And those who don't are not very good employers. Companies have programs to help employees having issues and a good team leader will try to help an employee having trouble which usually will show with the quality of his present work versus his past. It's not the 50ies and 60ies anymore. Yeah some companies will fire people on the spot but it's not as common as it used to be. In many fields they'll try to help you before firing you.
I won’t comment on things that aren’t public knowledge. Neither should anyone.
What do you mean by protecting? Hire some bodyguards to follow him to prevent any bad decision from the kid? I understand what you're saying, but there is a limit where it's on player's shoulders to decide to behave like a professional athlete.
I don’t like speculating on things like this either. But just looking at the way Galchenyuk’s career projected, it was a pretty dramatic drop off from 2016-2018 and everything that followed after. It wouldn’t be a shock to anyone if there was something much larger at play there.
