NHL teams can't develop players
Why money, staff and knowledge aren't enough
I don’t often read books.
But when I start one that resonates, I finish it within the day.
Here’s what I read yesterday.
Online anons argue for reform in how kids experience sports. Ted Kroeten, The Talent Thief’s author, did it in real life with his play-based soccer program Joy of the People.
Reading Thief reminded me of how I fell in love with hockey. Not when my parents signed me up at 7, but when I started scrimmaging with strangers at the park at 12.
Reading Thief reminded me of some of the best coaching I’ve done, with just six kids on a half sheet during COVID lockdown. Two of those kids will play for Canada U20 in Windsor, in a couple of weeks.
Reading Thief also reminded me of why even the best-staffed, best-funded NHL teams don’t, or can’t, develop star players.
When I worked for the Toronto Maple Leafs between 2017 and 2020, I thought we did a good job of turning prospects into NHLers. Zach Hyman, Trevor Moore, Mason Marchment, Andreas Johnsson, Travis Dermott, Justin Holl, Timothy Liljegren, Rasmus Sandin, Pierre Engvall, Joseph Woll, et al. Not a bad cohort compared to what the other PD departments across the league were producing.
However, none of our projects matched the impact of stars such as Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and Morgan Rielly, early draft picks who arrived fully-formed and immediately imposed themselves at the NHL level. The players we built brought value, but none proved irreplaceable like the ones we took.
Why?
In Thief, Kroeten (a Minnesotan who played hockey, among many other sports), argues that professional development structures fixate on overload (bigger/stronger/faster). However, the true hallmark of an elite performer is their ability to underload (find the advantage/use less energy/make others do the work).
Overload matters in a fast, physical sport such as hockey, but underload is the underlying quality that makes overload productive: a burst of speed (out of a glide), a change of direction (after a deceptive move); an aggressive net drive (after an east-west play).
NHL teams don’t respect underload. Career coaches frown upon those who glide into space, melt away from contact or delay for help. The players who habitually do those things slide in the draft, or go undrafted, or get traded after failing to immediately produce. In hindsight, what we did in Toronto was to merely give the habitual underloader a bit more runway, a bit more opportunity.
In Thief, Kroeten posits that the acquisition of underload instincts happens implicitly, via play, before puberty. By the time an NHL team acquires a prospect, most of the die has already been cast.
How would I develop players differently if I ran an NHL PD department?
I’m not sure of the answer, though I don’t think it even is the right question.
The way I see it, the biggest problem with high-level sports is that the adults running the show no longer play. When I think back of my former NHL colleagues who grew up with play but no longer have the time or permission to do it, I feel sad.
As Kroeten writes at the conclusion of Thief, the adults should behave more like the Oldest Kids at the Park: join the game, play more, talk less.
Enough writing. I’m going outside to play some tennis.