Flames benching star players

[Radical Canadian Goose]

For tonights game the Flames are not dressing stars Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan, along with Lance Bouma, apparently due to disciplinary issues. Rumours are the 3 showed up just before practice MOnday morning (potentially partying to hard at a Super Bowl party.) and were sluggish on the ice, forcing coach Bob Hartley to storm off the ice 25 minutes into practice.

Is this punishment too harsh for a team with a distant shot at making the playoffs?

How long until Hartley is fired?

 

[Really?]

No, it is not too harsh. Conduct detrimental to the team should get players benched. If Hartley gets fired than the Flames are in the wrong. As a coach, you must take the bull by the horns and actually run he team. I don't care who the player is or who you are playing, if players show up for work in a condition that is detrimental to the team, they should be benched. Hartley should not have stormed off...he should have excused the three from practice and sent them home, LIKE ANY OTHER JOB.

 

[Akhilleus]

Tom Coughlin is criticized for not benching his star wideout Odell Beckham Jr, despite his behavior on the field. It was a must win game for the Giants, who were also contending, and it was in a critical point of the game. Coughlin still got a lot of heat for leaving Beckham in the game.

That's just one scenario. How about the Cleveland Browns, who apparently covered up Johnny Manziel showing up to practice drunk? Or the Cincinnati Bengals, and all of their behavior problems. Right now, these on and off the field/ice/court behavior problems are something that seems like a current problem. Coaches and staff are being blamed for not controlling their players. They're being scrutinized because athletes are looked at as role models, and the behavior they're showing is not role model behavior.

And now when a coach goes beyond the aspect of winning the game, to send a message to his players and get strict about personal behavior and high standards, you want to be to critical of that too? Unbelievable. A coach that is willing to punish his star players and risk losing games because of it, is a good coach in my book. Especially if that coach goes on to win the games too, but just the fact that he is willing to do that in order to send a long term message to the players involved, and the rest of the team.

Fans are ridiculous. It's a lose-lose scenario for coaches in sports in today's game. They're damned if they do, and damned if they don't.

 

[Poop Master Flex]

Considering how much the Flames have fallen from grace in the span of a season I don't blame Hartley at all and there's a good chance actions like this are part of a bigger problem within the Flames organization. All I know is 1 season ago this team played their ass off and fought every game and that's simply not happening this year, they don't have the fire they had just 1 season ago and that probably makes the actions of guys like Monahan and Johnny Hockey more infuriating for that reason.

I don't think Hartley is the problem at all and he really shouldn't be getting disciplined for doing this. For Calgary to make the playoffs they will have to go on an absolute tear for the remainder of the season and considering the fire they had is currently not there he has to do something to try and get it back. When the Flames are playing hard like last year they are the funnest team in the league to watch, this year it's been more depressing than anything.

 

[Bagpipes]

It's too often difficult to look at professional athletes as "normal people" but when it pertains to these kinds of situations, I think that's very important.

Simply put, if showing up to work intoxicated in any sense of the word is against your employer's policy, the offender should be reprimanded at the employer's discretion.

No "normal" person could go to work visibly intoxicated and not be reprimanded, so why would anyone think a professional athlete should be held to a lesser standard?

 

[Coco]

Knowing little about sports, how is this a bad thing? He disciplined employees who weren't meeting the standard of their position or organization. Seems completely reasonable to me.

Hartley may well get canned, but not over this. Anyone I've talked to about this is on his side. And from what little local media I've seen covering this, nobody is really siding against him (though once again, I don't follow too closely).

Non-story?