Leadership

There are so many layers to both the Chris Simon and Kyle Okposo issues that, to be honest, I've been all over the place deciding what I want to say on this blog. I've decided to leave the Okposo case for a few more days.

As for the events surrounding Chris Simon, I'll address one issue. There is no point rambling on about Colin Campbell (an honest slip of the tongue that was not race-related), the suspension (10-15 games would have been my call) and what Simon did (troubling, inexcusable).

What did amaze me - although I guess it shouldn't have - was that any fan, reporter or anyone around the league could be cynical about what transpired at Iceworks on Monday. To recap: Charles Wang took charge. Instead of taking the easy way out, he proactively sought to help Chris Simon. Garth Snow and Ted Nolan got on board. There were a series of meetings with Simon, and later the captains and the whole team. The Islanders acted as a family. They stuck together. They backed each other up.

Whether you worked at Dairy Barn, Morgan Stanley, the New York Post, wherever, isn't this how you would like to be respected? Coincidentally, I ran into a neighbor of mine on the flight home from Toronto after the Simon hearing on Tuesday. Turns out he worked at Computer Associates during the 1980s. My neighbor hasn't been associated in any way with Charles Wang for 20 years. Even when he was at CA as a young employee, he didn't work closely with Charles. In other words, he has no dog in the hunt. But do you know what he said to me? This:

"I read about how Charles went to your practice rink and kind of led the charge in doing the right thing for Chris Simon. I know a lot of fans who thought you guys would distance yourselves from Simon, maybe even release him. But I wasn't surprised. When I was at CA, no matter who it was, Charles got involved and was always there to help. You never forget that."

How a few experienced hockey writers - including some that have reported on hockey mismanagement for decades - or even some of the fans on the message boards could view Monday's events as anything but impressive, inspirational...well, that's sad.

On Wednesday, the Islanders lost a close hockey game. On Monday, they won big.

Richards and DP, growing older together

I just got the following release from the Flyers:

"The Philadelphia Flyers announced today that they have signed center Mike Richards to a 12-year contract extension, according to club General Manager Paul Holmgren. Richards’ new contract will start next season and run through the 2019-2020 season."

Good for Mike and the Flyers, good for the Flyers fans.

We saw the reaction to the Islanders' signing of Rick DiPietro to a landmark 15-year deal. Rick is the face, heart and soul of the franchise. My friends at the Flyers say similar things about Mike Richards.

Will the hockey media, especially the experts in Canada, have as much fun with the Flyers' long-long-long-term deal as they did with the Islanders' deal?

We'll see. That's another thing about the sports press: when they do not know how to react - or don't have the guts to take a stand - they resort to bad jokes.

Just over a year later, the DiPietro deal can be considered revolutionary, the door-opener for lengthy deals all over sports. It was also brilliant for the Islanders and their fans. Call it the deal of the decade and a half.

Quiet Riot

The PR/media lesson from the Mitchell Report: if people in sports truly want to keep something out of the media, they can.

Some of our best sports journalists were trying to track down the names on the list for weeks. When it was announced earlier this week that the list would be made public today, the search intensified. The New York Yankess are covered like no other sports team in the world. Turns out Senator Mitchell's biggest scoops came from a personal "trainer" associated with a few players in the Bronx.

My point: if a player or a team or an executive really wants something out, he'll get it out. If, as in this case, they don't, it's amazing how secretive they can be.

By the way, did the Yankees get Santana yet?

Merry Christmas, Mr. Resch

It's that holiday time of the year when I tend to get a little nostalgic and think of people who helped me along the way. I was waiting for the hilarity and shame of the Petrino press conference last night when ESPNews showed clips of the Flyers beating the Pens behind two hat tricks. There was a graphic that said the last time the Flyers had two hat tricks in a game was on Dec. 18, 1986 when they beat the Islanders, 9-4, at the old Spectrum with hat tricks from Dave Poulin and Tim Kerr.

I was an intern for the Flyers that season, commuting back and forth on the subway from La Salle in between classes and Explorer basketball games (anyone remember the "L Train," Lionel Simmons?). The Flyers went to the Stanley Cup Final that season, beating the Rangers and post-Easter Epic Islanders along the way. I made a lot of good contacts, but it was the Flyers players - their dedication, their class, their decency with the PR intern - that inspired me to take a run at this business.

Those Flyers made it to the 7th game of the Cup Final against Edmonton, tied after two periods, before Wayne Gretzky decided enough was enough. But I'll never forget those players, coached by a young hothead, I mean hotshot, named Mike Keenan.

So thank you: Dave Poulin, Tim Kerr, Peter Zezel, Brian Propp, Brad Marsh and the then 38-year old backup goaltender, Glenn Resch. As fate would have it, several players later became Islanders and I was able to thank them in person: Brad McCrimmon, Doug Crossman, Ron Sutter, Craig Berube, J.J. Daigneault and the best man of them all, Ron Hextall.

I started with the Islanders in December of 1987 perhaps even more intimidated because, after all, these were my Islanders. The first player to put an arm around me and give me tips on how to work the room was Steve Konroyd, who had been acquired for my all-time favorite, John Tonelli. Steve's grace has stuck with me forever.

He wasn't alone helping me settle in those first few seasons. Thank you: Brent Sutter, Bob Bassen, Pat LaFontaine, Denis Potvin, Alan Kerr, Bryan Trottier and especially Patrick Flatley and Kelly Hrudey.

Over time, when you get to look close enough, you realize these players met their dreams of NHL success as much on the strength of their hearts as their talents.

Family squabble

So we have our first in-house controversy of the season. As you'd expect, Ted Nolan handled it perfectly.

To recap, with the Islanders about to start a brief 5-on-3 power play in the final minutes of Wednesday's game in Atlanta, what would usually be a harmless Fox shot of the Islanders bench became something more. Assistant coach Gerard Gallant was seen making a very emphatic point to dman Marc-Andre Bergeron. Many have assumed MAB might have protested because he didn't like being on the bench for the power play.

One of the many cool things about Ted: while Gallant and Bergeron smiled off Greg Logan's questions about it yesterday after practice and said everything was coming up roses, Ted gave one of those answers that had Logan and Mears and King and the ITV crew and even the PR guy looking at each other like, "This is good."

The head coach didn't laugh it off or try to sweep it under the rug. He made it clear he was not happy with what transpired and he intended to talk to BOTH parties about it.

I really liked that. It's so easy for head coaches to jump on players. Ted's position was that he was going to get to the bottom of it but make no mistake - everyone was wrong. Of course, if this was Isiah and Eddy Curry, it might have bumped the latest faux-Yankees rumors off the back page.

(Did you see the one today about how the San Fran Giants might take Matsui's contract off the Yankees' hands and trade a 27-year old lefty who went 14-7 last year for him? Man, no wonder New Yorkers get a reputation for thinking they can have everything).

Anyway, back to Ted. He handled the situation with MAB and the assistant they call "Turk" honestly and directly. There's only one hockey coach I know who would have handled it the same way. That was the guy with 739, I mean 740 wins and four Cup rings as Islanders coach.

All action, no talk

Maybe we should be more like the NBA, where a Quentin Richardson can pop off about the Big Three of the Celtics not impressing him and get tons of press for it. Q is having trouble shooting the ball in the basket, but he's 1-for-1 when aiming at his own foot.

With the Islanders playing Atlanta today on the heels of getting smoked by the Thrashers at home just a few days ago, think of all the possibilties.

Guerin could say the Thrashers are nothing and the Islanders owe them one. Andy Sutton could talk about how glad he is to be out of Atlanta. Ricky D could fire up the troops with some classic trash-talking. Don Waddell could make up a story to the press about how the Islanders disrespected them on Saturday by not giving the winners any credit.

But alas, none of that was to be found this morning at the rink. When the Thrashers' skate was ending, their assistant coach (and possible head coach next season) Brad "Beast" McCrimmon skated over to our bench and told me how his team better be ready tonight because they have so much respect for Ted Nolan and the Islanders. McCrimmon has been around long enough to understand Atlanta will see a different team than the one at the Coliseum on Saturday.

And that was it, one of the many reasons why I love this league. No garbage, no talk. The Islanders and Thrashers know all that matters is what happens when the puck drops tonight at 7:05.


Notes:

Looks like Berard and the Fantastic IVth are the scratches tonight.

Ruslan Fedotenko was asked by the press what it was like to be back with Guerin and Comrie - again - and, bless him, Tank tried really, really hard to come up with a good answer.

Ted Nolan is so under the weather, he asked if it was okay for Gerard Gallant to do the post-skate media scrum this morning. Here's hoping when you see Ted on the FSN post-game tonight, an Islanders victory has contributed to bringing some of the color back to his face.

Saw an amazing John Fogarty concert last night in a 2,000-seat palace about ten miles outside of downtown Atlanta. I have fond memories of the (North Fork) Westbury Music Fair, but like a transformed Coliseum, Long Island could use a joint like that.

It's a marathon...

Just two weeks ago tomorrow, the Islanders beat the Rangers 2-1 at the Garden. It was the Islanders' sixth win in their last eight games and for the season they were 11-6. Calls came in from USA Today and elsewhere, hoping to speak with Garth and Ted and some of the players about how the gritty-gutty Islanders were getting it done. (Because, after all, the experts had picked them to finish around 14th in the conference. That's where they were supposed to be, darn it!).

After that first Garden triumph, the Islanders dropped their next two games: at home to the Canadiens and in Boston. Just like that, the Islanders had lost four of six. Some of the reporters we weren't able to hook up with suddenly were saying maybe they'd catch us down the road.

The Islanders won the back end of the home-and-home with the Bruins, lost to Dallas in overtime at home on Monday, and then the Orange and Blue did something they hadn't even been able to do when Laurie Boschman was a first-liner for the expansion Senators - they beat Ottawa at home. Man, I was so happy last Wednesday night. Everyone in Islanders Country was feeling pretty good and those media requests started piling up again.

Then came the loss Thursday in the Garden and last night's first period flop to Atlanta.

Four days ago, the Islanders were 9-4-1 in their last 13.

Now they enter Monday's game against the Bruins with only two wins in their last seven games.

I'm sure you could see where I was going with this paragraphs ago. (Sorry, just ask my wife or my colleagues: it takes me a while).

In summation:

1. It's a very long season.

2. As Carolina and Tampa Bay proved in their Cup years, the key is how your team comes together for the home stretch.

3. Welcome back, Tamby.

4. It's so much nicer reading Islandermania after Islanders wins than losses.

5. My word to fans of any NHL teams that look like they could use their Butch Goring: it's probably not happening, if at all, until February. For a while, the answers will have to come from within, or within the farm system.

6. I don't understand why my buddies at WFAN aren't too quick to have NHL guests, yet Mad Dog yesterday morning had the football coach at Texas Tech breaking down the Missouri-Oklahoma matchup for 20 minutes.

I know that last one has nothing to do with the rest, but it ticked me off and I had to get it in there.

See you Monday for Kids Night. If you can, please bring something for the Marines' Toys for Tots collection.