By Rob Ficiur
This week I listened to Mike Keenan, two years removed from being the Calgary Flames head coach, state that he wanted to coach again in the NHL.   If the Flames had let him coach the third year of his contract Keenan was sure that what he was building would have born fruit.  Keenan currently ranks fifth in all time wins by an NHL coach (672).  Whether Iron Mike could have brought a championship (or a playoff run) to Calgary we will never know.  But we do know from history that most coaches and players continue their careers long after they are at the prime.
In the last two months, the World Series Manager (Tony Larussa) and the CFL Grey Cup Coach (Wally Buono) both announced retired from coaching on top – resigning their head coach (manager) positions.  Why did these champions retire now while many others keep going?
1.  Age is sometimes a factor.  Larussa is 67 years old; and Buono is 62.  Former Red Wings head coach Scotty Bowman was 69 years old when he retired after his team won the 2002 Stanley Cup.  Coaches and managers can and do continue working through their sixties and into their seventies, but at some point in time a person’s energy level is not what is was 30 years earlier.
2.  They have nothing left to prove.  After managing or coaching teams to championships on numerous occasions, what more do these people have to prove?  Scotty Bowman won a record nine Stanley Cups; Buono (the winningest coach in CFL history) won five Grey Cups; and Larussa (who ranks third in all times wins by a manger) just won his third world series title.  Yes, each coach could come back and try to win another title … but they have shown they are not one year wonders.
3.  Retirement does not mean retirement.  Retiring from coaching does not mean the coach is out of the game.  Wally Buono still maintains the job as BC Lions General Manager, a full time job for most other teams.  After a few years of consulting, Scotty became a special assistant to a new Chicago Black Hawks General Manager Stan Bowman lead the Hawks to a cup championship.  Scotty said he would not have come out of his retirement to work for anyone other than his son.  (Helping his son’s Black Hawks win the 2010 Stanley Cup was a different kind of thrill for Scotty Bowman).
4. As a champion coach you can retire before you are fired.  The saying is that coaches are hired to be fired.  In this win now mentality of professional sports this is truer than ever.  Last week Randy Carlyle, who led the Anaheim Ducks to the 2007 Stanley Cup championship, was fired.  Four years ago Carlyle was a hero, but four years is an eon ago when a team is losing.  The Calgary Flames won the 1989 Stanley Cup under head coach Terry Crisp.  Crisp was fired less than a year later when the team was eliminated in the first round.
How many coaches / managers are still with the team that they won a championship with?  In the NHL the last four Stanley Cup winning coaches are still with their current team.  In Major League Baseball the 2008, 2009 and 2010 managers are still with their teams; but after the recent 2011 season concluded the 2007 and 2006 World Series Managers were fired because their teams did not perform.
5.  People can and do un-retire.  After Chicago Bulls head coach Phil Jackson won his sixth championship in 1998, he announced he was retiring from coaching for good.  Jackson and his superstar Michael Jordan were going to retire on top, having won six championships in eight years.  A year after retiring Phil Jackson was hired to coach the Los Angeles Lakers.  In the last decade Jackson won five championships with the Lakers.  Officially Phil Jackson has retired, but history has taught us that with the right situation (team and money) a successful coach will unretired.  Having a year or two away from the game can give them new energy and ideas which could lead to another championship.
Fans, sports broadcasters and fired coaches (Mike Keenan) can always look back and second guess when it was the right time to fire a coach.  With this NHL season being at the one quarter mark, four of the thirty teams have fired their coach.  Probably that many more will be fired (and perhaps re-hired like Bruce Boudrea the fired Washington Captials coach who became the new coach in Anaheim three days later) before the season ends.
Nowadays sports is as much about us arm chair managers expressing our opinions to friends or on websites as it is about watching the games on the ice or field.