http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=630098

Think he takes it over Hitchcock?

I want him to win just for the acceptance speech.

I think Hitchcock takes it. He took a 14th place team, although early in the season, and drove them to 2nd place in the conference. Without ant major roster changes in the process.

Tortorella is definitely deserving of the award though. Taking a team that squeaked into the playoffs last season to 1st in the conference through much of the season, getting all of his players to buy into his system, and keeping them focused while they spent preseason and the start of the season in Europe and had the drama of the Winter Classic... not to mention the cameras and crew following them around while filming 24/7.

I think the walrus deserves it honestly.

The preseason projects for the Rangers ranged from winning the division to being a 6th seed.
St. Louis was projected as a team in the 6-10 seed range.
Ottawa? Most people picked them to be near the bottom or actually 15th in the conference. Instead they spent almost all year in the top 8, competed with Boston for the division until mid-March, and managed to get into the postseason.

I know the non-contending teams often don't get the best coach, but I think he was a guy who presided over the biggest overachiever in the NHL this year.

I actually would have replaced Dineen with Torts. Torts did a great job this year, but I just think Dineen and the other 2 nominees impressed more.

I think Hitch should win in it.

Hitch will get it as a lifetime achievement thing. Like Hank and the Vezina.

I think it's a mistake to judge a coach's job by how the media projected their season would go.

Then how do you project who did the best job? When you have 16 coaches that make the playoffs, what parameters should be used to decide who is best? I'm not even trying to be a smart ass here, what do you guys believe it should be based on?

Ottawa plays in a pretty weak division, same goes for Florida. It's a lot of games against non-playoff, weaker teams. I would've given the nomination to Dineen over Moustache (MacLean). Dineen took over a fluoundering team that was completely overhauled in the offseason, including pretty suspect goaltending, and won his division. Then again, the Panthers had the least amount of ROW of Eastern conference teams in the playoffs. Meh, it's a crapshoot really with those two. I think Laviolette and Holmgren got shafted ( ). They moved a lot of important pieces of that team and didn't skip a beat. That's impressive.

Don't forget, the Rangers were pretty much thought to be fighting for a spot again by a lot of pundits prior to the season. I think it's more impressive for a team to go from "might make the playoffs" to winning the conference than it is to go from probably get a lottery pick to almost missing the playoffs. Especially considering the Rangers play in the most competitive divison in the NHL.

Holmgren should be the GM of the year to me. He overhauled the core of his team and beyond that, fixed holes. Progner went down and he was aggressive before the deadline to get not one, but two d-men. It's stuff like that that can win you a Cup.

Oh hey, let's not get ahead of ourselves here. Holmgren DID NOT replace Pronger. There's veery few d-men that can replace him (as hated as he is). He did a nice job plugging in those holes, but their D is a bit of a weakness. That team relies on a strong offense to win. DESPITE the weak D, and the struggles in goaltending, AND bringing in fresh faces while ousting two very important core forwards Laviolette once again has that team going deep in the postseason. I don't have a doubt that they'll get past the Devils. The guy deserved to at least get nominated.

Holmgren signed that Bryzgalov contract thus disqualifying him for the length of said contract.

I'd say Holmgren, Tallon, Sather. Although Holmgren with Bryzgalov....it's a turn off that he gave out that contract to a questionable goalie. Bryzgalov could be the downfall of the Flyers.

You look at the roster, the cap space, the moves made, the division (aka the quality of the competition) and how the team performed.

He took a team that didn't have a whole lot up front (not one 30 goal scorer, not one player with more than 60 points) and got them to buy into a defensive system that came together and turned a goalie platoon into the best combo in the league.

He did all of this while playing in the Central Division which sent four teams to the playoffs, all of them with over 100 points. By the way, they got there with the second highest ROW in the league so not a whole lot of shoot out points and only 6 loser points.

Hitchcock gets the award in my opinion.

Torts also had his leading scorer from last season utterly fall apart, though Gabby and Richards did pick up that slack.

Holmgren completely shakes up the core of his team. His team drops from a 2 seed to a 5 seed, and they lose 3 standings points from last season to this season. That's GM of the year?

"Good job keeping your team at about the same talent level, Paul. Here's an award."

No.

This award isn't voted on by GM's like other awards - it's voted on by the press. The same press that Tort's pretty much habitually starves of both facetime and usable quotes.

I could see saying it might cost him enough to get over the top but obviously they like him well enough considering he's a finalist.

By "press" I think you mean the broadcasters, as opposed to the professional hockey writers, correct?

I chuckle sometimes when I realize that Dubinsky was the leading scorer for the 2010-2011 NY Rangers!

Yes, and I guess that should read 'usable sound bites'.

Or get you a lottery pick in the next draft.

Ok, good point. I staand by Laviolette though!

Laviolette is interesting to me mainly because the Flyers were one of those teams that were so hard to shut down. They rallied constantly. I feel like that's something you can attribute to Laviolette.

They made him a finalist so they could then say "Fuck you" and give it to someone else. I'm not sure I would blame them either.

I was pretty disgusted after his game 1 press conference. Nice, softball questions as set ups to compliment his players on good plays they made, and you'd think they asked him what color the sky is. He is really quite an asshole.

Yeah, you have to help to promote the game a little, and we're in the biggest market on arguably one of the most popular teams in the league. I've always felt Sather should have been more available to the media, and Tortorella does nothing but alienate those that could help get the team stories in the spotlight.

Funny, but as much as the Yankees and Giants are so much more popular than the Rangers, Girardi and Coughlin couldn't get away with half the shit Tortorella pulls with the media.

I agree w/you about promoting the game better--but considering the GM of the Rangers won't even talk to the NY media, why should Torts feel he has to be ultra-cooperative with them? We know he has trouble controlling his emotions, too. I think he's been so terse the last couple of weeks because he's worried if he answers the questions he gets the way he wants to, he'll be broke in a matter of days from all the fines he'd get hit with by the league. To me, he looks like he's ready to explode most of the time, especially right after losses.

meh, Torts is just Herbing on this issue. He's got a reason for everything he does. As long as he brings home the hardware, I don't care what he has to do. Be a jerk to the media? Obee-kaybee. Whatever works.

Who cares? Bill Belichick has been doing it for years. As long as you're winning no one gives a shit.

I think he should just punch Larry Brooks in the face and get it over with.