B.C.FAN wrote:Wally was on Team 1040 with Sekeres and Price at 11 a.m. Friday and said the biggest factor for him in searching for a head coach is personality. I forget the term he used but he suggested that they're worked hard as an organization to build team character, and they got away from that this year. I missed the end of the interview but it may be available as a podcast later.
Yes, Wally is looking at "personality". But what does 'personality' mean to Wally. Does that mean he wants a 'personality' that will defer to Wally in terms of personell decisions, look up to Wally as a 'living legend', and view Wally as the 'all knowing 'mentor'.
Wally stepped down as Head Coach, after a winning Grey Cup season. But it was not all roses between 2008 and the start of 2011 and there were many calling for Wally's head in 2010 and early 2011. Everything went right in those last 11 games of 2011 and the playoffs and Wally, no fool, walked away a winner, when that was not looking as the likley scenario.
Benevedes was always Wally's hand picked successor. Chapdelaine, who had been our offensive coordinator, when we won the Grey Cup in 2006, left at the end of that season because he knew that he would never get a chance to succeed Wally. Benevedes, our special teams coordinator was the chosen one. That was always the succession plan. The question is why?
What was so special about Mike Benevedes? I guess he had the right 'personality' for Wally. However, how about looking for a more important hiring attribute? It's called leadership. Something we didn't get from Benevedes. But why would Wally hire a leader? That's not what he is looking for. He is the 'leader' and the HC job is to be the 'follower'. That might work out great for Wally but it doesn't work out great for the players or the fans.
I find it interesting to see which ex-players get the chance to coach. It's never the Carl Kidd's or the Korey Banks - players who were viewed as leaders by the players when they played. The two players, who were viewed as leaders when they played for our Leos and became coaches - Barrin Miles and Jarious Jackson - have left.
One thing that has to change is how we treat our veteran players. Yes, sometimes its good to be one year ahead of the curve when it comes to releasing or trading a veteran. But too many star veterans leave our Leos bitter. Jason Clermont, Dave Dickenson, Geroy Simon, Korey Banks, and now Dante Marsh will leave our Leos organization with a very bitter pill in their mouth. No wonder we have trouble signing free agents. That's not the way we used to do it - we found places for our ex-stars like Jimmy Young, Lui Passaglia, and Jamie Taris.
I'm surprised that some thought Dickenson might want to come to B.C. as the HC. It's easy to forget that Wally was ready to dump Dickenson at the end of 2005 for Printers or that Dickenson left bitter at the end of 2007. Dickenson often chafed under Wally and at one time, while playing quarterback here, to the media that 'he played for his teammates and not Wally. Dickenson would not have come here to have Wally tell him which players to play. He was and is still too much of a leader for that.
I look at Calgary's coaching lineup this season - Hufnagel, Dickenson and Stubler. I compare that with Benevedes, Washington and Khari Jones. No wonder why Calgary is playing in the Grey Cup and we are not. We would have had a much better season if we had Stubler and Chap as assistants because at least they had expectations for players at practices and during games while Benevedes either ranted or belly bumped or looked for deals for ice cream treats.
I remember well the 'love in' way too many sports writers and media types had in 2012, as we got all kinds of corny feel good stories about the relationship between Benevedes and Buono. I was wondering if the Leos publicicy department was going to create a movie about Benevedes admiring Buono while Buono talked about his protege in glowing terms - I was waiting for them to announce that Carl Malden and Michael Douglas were going to be the actors chosen.
Buono gave Benevedes a two year extension. He had no intention of firing Benevedes if Benevedes would have just kept the Montreal game close, even if we lost, The injuries were going to be the excuse. But after getting destroyed in our last two regular season games and then blown out so badly by Montreal there was no way that Wally was going to be able to retain Benevedes. If he had chosen to do so, he was putting his own job in jeapordy and there was no way Wally was going to do that. So he had to say good bye to the guy who thought the sun shone on Wally, the guy that he had mentored, and the guy who he could tell which players to play and which players to discipline and how. Not easy to give up that kind of control.
But the fans deserved a true leader as a Head Coach. So do the players. The question is "Will we get a "true leader" or is "personality" a Wally code word for hiring a future Head Coach who will be easy for Wally to control?
Who we hire will be most interesting and whether that future Head Coach will be able to hire his own assistants.