Adrian Dater
First off, I’m not someone who believes too terribly much in the importance of awards. I’ve worked 32 years now in the media/journalism business, and I can tell you firsthand that awards in this business are almost complete, utter bullshite. And I say that as someone who has won a couple of nice journalism awards, including best sports story of the year in Colorado a few years ago, about Scott Parker’s post-playing concussion issues. Journalism awards almost always go like this: saddest story wins.
Any story about a tragedy, any story about some kind of malady that a person had and maybe overcame it or (or didn’t) automatically is labeled as “heroic, touching, heart-rendering” or pick any number of other touchy-feely adjectives. It doesn’t mean the story wasn’t good or the story wasn’t actually heart-rendering and touching, but it’s always these kinds of stories that win journalism awards, and most of the time they’re just awarded out of guilt by the judges. Or, they go to “Gotcha”-type stories, where some foul misdeed by someone was just matter-of-factly reported on by a writer, and yet they are branded as “great, investigative work” when really it was just dropped right into their lap.
At least, that’s my opinion anyway. No, I’m not at all cynical on this topic.
But wait: Joe Sakic really was NOT a finalist for NHL general manager of the year? Excuse me? What were the judges thinking here????
All Sakic did this year was reap the benefits of a bunch of brilliant moves, all while maintaining a ton of salary cap space, and he’s not even a finalist???? I mean, I had not only assumed Sakic would be a finalist for the award, for which the nominations were revealed today, but I thought he would win in a landslide.
Not even a finalist???
The three finalists, as revealed by the NHL today, were Lou Lamoriello of the Islanders, Jim Nill of Dallas and Julien BriseBois of the Lightning.
Look, Lamoriello and Nill being on the list, I don’t have any quibbles about. Lou remains one of the game’s greats at managing a team, and Jim Nill is a vastly underrated GM whose team is seven wins away from winning a Stanley Cup. But how the H-E-double-hockey-sticks does Julien BriseBois deserve the nomination for the Jim Gregory Award over Joe Sakic?
Nothing against BriseBois, but everyone knows that he inherited a great situation in Tampa after Steve Yzerman did all the heavy lifting building that team. That’s like succeeding Bill Gates at Microsoft, then bragging about your corporate earnings the next year.
Most of the voting for the NHL awards are done by members of the Professional Hockey Writers Association, of which yours truly is a member. But the PHWA itself does not vote on the GM award.
It’s a somewhat vague, secretive voting body. On the NHL official website it says this about the voting process:
Voting: NHL general managers and a panel of League executives, print and broadcast media vote for the Jim Gregory General Manager of the Year Award at the conclusion of the Second Round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, with the top three vote-getters designated as finalists.
Gee, how imaginative of the voters, right? Of the three finalists, all three have teams still alive in these playoffs. Unlike the PHWA and the other awards, which have to be voted upon right after the regular season ends, these voters get to wait all the way until after the second round to decide.
In other words, “Sorry Joe. Despite all those great moves this year and the last couple, despite doing it all and still keeping tons of cap room, despite your team being set up for years to come with these moves, your team sustained seven injuries to key guys in the second round and lost a Game 7 and, well, you’re canceled for this award.”
Like I said, awards are mostly all popularity-contest-sympathy shite. They don’t mean anything.
But Joe Sakic not being a finalist for GM of the year award?
As Colonel Potter on M*A*S*H always said:
Horse hockey.