Pedigree makes Yzerman good bet as GM
by Josh Brewster
Hockeytalk.biz | NHL Quick Shots

JULY 8, 2010 -- As a player, Steve Yzerman did it all in the NHL, winning three Stanley Cups, scoring 692 goals and serving as captain for longer than any player in franchise history.  Now a rookie GM with Tampa Bay, Yzerman, who served in the same role for gold medal-winning Team Canada at the 2010 Olympics, looks to bring his recent executive success to the Gulf of Mexico.

A keener eye, however, can see that Yzerman’s road to an executive position has been in the cards since Day One of his NHL career.  When you think about it, fortune smiled on Yzerman from the day he was drafted in June of 1983. 

Holding the fourth selection in that draft, the Red Wings had future Hall-of-Famer and Michigan native Pat Lafontaine penciled in as their first round pick.  The Islanders, who owned the third pick despite having just won their fourth consecutive Cup thanks to GM Bill Torrey’s shrewd trading, nabbed Lafontaine just one spot ahead of Detroit.

Enter Jim Devellano.

Elected to the Hall of Fame as a builder in this year’s class, Devellano was the Ilitch family’s first hire when they purchased the Red Wings in the Spring of 1982 for a whopping nine million dollars.

Yzerman the Player	Yzerman the Rookie GM

Upon his hire, Devellano—who won three Cups as a scout and assistant to Torrey—declared that he would never trade a draft pick.  For too long, the previous Norris family ownership group saw valuable picks traded away for aging talent.  Now, Devellano declared some 28 years ago, that would change.  For a few years, he was able to keep that promise.

Devellano’s first draft with the Red Wings came on that fateful day in June 1983.  Since ol’ pal Torrey upstaged him by picking Lafontaine, Devellano chose Yzerman (Buffalo picked next at the five spot and took goalie Tom Barrasso.  Earlier, the North Stars made Brian Lawton the top pick, and Hartford took Sylvain Turgeon second). 

Yzerman didn’t know it at the time, and obviously the business of embarking on a 22-year NHL career with the Wings was his first concern—but his potential as an executive skyrocketed that day. 

DEVELLANO’S STUDENTS

Having declared himself committed to the draft table and unwilling to trade picks, Devellano set the table for a long Detroit tenure by Yzerman. 

That 1983 draft would include the late Bob Probert, also Petr Klima, Joe Kocur, Stu Grimson and Lane Lambert.  The next draft included Sean Burr and Doug Houda, and in 1985, a crafty free agent move—unseen at the time—would land Adam Oates.  Devellano smartly brought in Ron Duguay and kept John Ogrodnick to serve as Yzerman’s earliest and best linemates.  Gerard Gallant became a quality forward and the Wings would for the first time in decades achieve playoff success through the late 80s, led by coach Jacques Demers, another astute Devellano hire. 

Devellano served as GM for eight seasons, until moving upstairs in June of 1990.

As Yzerman’s career evolved, so did the careers of a number of Devellano’s notable executive protégées, including Neil Smith, Don Waddell, Ken Holland, Jim Lites and Bryan Murray.  Smith would go on to lead the Rangers to its 1994 Cup win.  Holland would become Detroit’s GM and win four Cups after Devellano kicked himself upstairs to the President’s role.  Lites went on to a successful tenure in Dallas with Tom Hicks’ NHL Stars and MLB Rangers.  Murray would lead the Senators to a Cup final and ironically, in an earlier gig, select the key Ducks who defeated his Sens club for the Cup in 2007.  Don Waddell served for years as Atlanta’s GM before moving upstairs as President in favor of Rick Dudley this Spring.  If student success is a measure of a professor, then Devellano is one of the top executives of the modern era.

Yzerman the player was surrounded by up-and-coming executives schooled by a man who would become a living legend.

Imagine if a lesser talent had been hired to run the Red Wings.  Had Yzerman been traded, he likely wouldn’t have had an opportunity to work for the kinds of executives he has over the years.

After Yzerman retired in 2006, the Red Wings made him a vice president and educated him on the finer points of running a club.  A hard worker, he held the position through his Hockey Canada tenure, right up to his hire by the Lightning.

The loyalty shown Yzerman by the Ilitch family—a famous story goes that matriarch Marian Ilitch stopped the club from trading Yzerman in the early 90s—paved the way for his being in the right place at the right time.  Who knows whether his schooling would have been as strong had Yzerman had to look elsewhere for an executive career path?

With a pedigree from the University of Devellano, as it were, Stevie Y was a slam-dunk choice as Lightning GM.

MR. YZERMAN BUSTS A MOVE

Martin St. Louis Signed a 4-year extension

Since his hire, Yzerman has made some solid decisions.

First, he passed along the loyalty that he was so freely given by the Red Wings, smartly extending Martin St. Louis’ contract for four years.  A key identity player for Tampa, St. Louis will be 39 when the deal expires.  Yzerman is happy that the Lightning legend will stick around, and hey, it looks like Executive Yzerman got the star at a sort-of hometown discount ($22.5M for 4 years, starting in 2011-12).  St. Louis could have commanded more at the end of this season, which would have been his last.  Yzerman also deserves props for not allowing St. Louis to become a UFA next July, which would have also driven his price up. 

After Yzerman left St. Louis off of his gold medal-winning Team Canada club (St. Louis scored 29 goals and 94 points last season), some in the media suggested that St. Louis resented the Hockey Canada decision.  That speculation was fueled by St. Louis’ suggestion months ago that he might request a trade if the franchise didn’t straighten its messy affairs.  However, St. Louis, for his part, scoffed at the notion of any rift, arguing recently that he was in fact very happy with the Yzerman hire. 

"I had seen both sides of the mountain in Tampa," St. Louis told the St. Pete Times. "I'd seen the good days and the bad days. I needed something that showed we were going to win here now.  When they hired Steve Yzerman, I just felt, 'This is the guy.' "

Yzerman wisely brought Pavel Kubina back to the Lightning family after the defenseman departed the club after its Stanley Cup win in 2003-04 led to a salary dump as the team and league endured the 2004-05 lockout.  Kubina, who signed with Tampa for two years at $7.7M, spent the post-lockout years with Toronto (three seasons) and Atlanta (one).  The easygoing Kubina is very welcome in Tampa and will join veteran Matty Ohlund and sophomore Viktor Hedman on an up-and-coming defense.  Yzerman also bagged defenseman Brett Clark, signing him up for $3M over two years.

Dan Ellis arrives to battle for the number one goaltending position, and says that he’s still friends with incumbent Mike Smith from their days in Dallas.  Nice terms for Tampa in that Ellis will earn $1.5M for each of the next two seasons, while Smith gets $2.4M for this, his last season before becoming an unrestricted free agent.  $3.9M in the nets is a tidy sum, and won’t weigh too heavily on the salary cap.  What’s more, a legitimate battle will ensue in the nets, as Ellis won 15 games in 31 appearances in Nashville’s nets and played 110 games over the past three seasons with the Preds. 

Yzerman hired Guy Boucher as coach.  Boucher arrives from AHL Hamilton after capturing last season's Pieri Award as coach of the year.  Boucher's 2009-10 Bulldogs allowed only 182 goals in 80 games-best in the league-and simultaneously finished third in offense.  At 38, he's the League's youngest head coach. 

Boucher intends to use seven defensemen and 11 forwards in his lineup.  His thinking, as reported by Damian Cristodero of the St. Pete Times this week, is multifaceted.  For one, an extra defenseman is valuable in case of injury to a defenseman.  Instead of being down to five d-men, Boucher can stay steady with six.  He also notes that the position is punishing and a seventh gives the club some security, not between games, but in-game.  As for the fourth-line spot that would then go unfilled by a forward, Boucher says that whoever is hot that night on the forward ranks can have some extra ice time.

At his first draft, Yzerman selected highly rated right wing Brett Connolly of Prince George of the WHL. 

More changes will be made to Tampa’s roster as the summer goes along, but with the schooling that the Executive Yzerman has received, it’s sure to be prudent and thoughtful.  One of Yzerman’s strengths is that he didn’t win the Cup until the end of his 14th season in the League.  That’s got to lend itself to patience, and help Yzerman steer clear of quick fixes.

Just as Professor Devellano would have prescribed.