Why Teflon Don Waddell had become toxic for the Thrashers
The Thrashers don’t have many fans, which is a problem. Except in his own organization and, we assume, his own household, Don Waddell had no fans. That was a bigger problem.
Even those few folks disposed to support this hockey team couldn’t bring themselves to endorse the Teflon Don. And there wasn’t much to endorse. In place since 1999, he’d presided over one playoff appearance and no postseason victories. He’d traded away the two best players in franchise annals because they wouldn’t re-up. Yet he clung to his job like grim death.
As of Wednesday, the Teflon Don clings no longer. The Thrashers positioned his move to president as a promotion, but it’s way more than that. It’s a re-branding.
Advertising 101: When you’ve got a faulty product, fix the bugs and change the name. The Thrashers feel there’s nothing wrong with their personnel that a bit of seasoning can’t remedy. Said Rick Dudley, now the second general manager in team history: “We’re a pretty good hockey team in position to be a really good hockey team.”
But would enough folks in Atlanta have dared to embrace a team with the toxic Don as its point man? He’s not an objectionable human being, and he’s not, contrary to popular belief, a dolt. He had, however, come to symbolize all that was wrong with the Thrashers in the same way Willie Martinez had become the flashpoint of Georgia football.
In other news, the Thrashers fired coach John Anderson on Wednesday. “We thought we had a good enough team to make the playoffs and we didn’t,” Dudley said. “Someone has to take the blame, and he did.”
The same never applied to Waddell, and nitpickers among us will say that his move upstairs is yet another instance of ineptitude gone not just unpunished but applauded. Those nitpickers need to find a new nit. The Thrashers just stopped being Waddell’s creation. He’s no longer the go-to guy in the organization. He’s just another guy with a nice title, same as Rich McKay.
Rich McKay used to be the Falcons’ GM. Late in 2007 he became team president. The Falcons as a competitive entity are overseen by new stewards — Thomas Dimitroff and Mike Smith — and the credit for those long-sought consecutive winning seasons has gone to Dimitty & Smitty, not the guy who does with whatever it is team presidents do. McKay is still part of the organization, but he’s not a part the public sees.
Loading ...And that’s how it will be with the Thrashers. They’re Dudley’s team to run, and this will be Dudley’s draft to wrangle. Waddell, who was apparently very skilled at saving his owners money, gets to work full-time on the business. “This has been going on for some time,” Waddell said Wednesday, speaking of the transition. “My plan was to get Rick in here and let him get his feet wet, and then put him in [the GM's] spot.”
Why the flurry of moves? Said Waddell: “There’s no better time than to make all the changes at once.”
The purported skill of this team notwithstanding, hockey in Atlanta is at a perilous place. The Thrashers just dumped Ilya Kovalchuk, missed the playoffs for the ninth time in 10 seasons and finished 28th in attendance to boot. Waddell insisted again Wednesday that this team won’t be moving, but at the moment there doesn’t seem much reason to keep it here.
But this is sports, and things can change. The last-place Braves imported a new GM from Kansas City in October 1990 and played in Game 7 of the 1991 World Series. “We’re at the point where Chicago was,” Dudley said, speaking of the NHL team that couldn’t draw flies six years ago but enters these playoffs as the No. 2 seed in the Western Conference.
Rick Dudley might or might not be the Thrashers’ John Schuerholz, but he’ll at least be afforded the benefit of the doubt. Too many people had stopped wondering about this team’s charter GM. Too many people made up their minds about the Teflon Don long ago.
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101 comments Add your comment
UGADawg83
April 14th, 2010
6:18 pm
On another subject-that was Jim Lampley not Jim Nance. Don’t ask me why I remember that/
Joe Friday
April 14th, 2010
6:22 pm
“Will Rick be responsible for hiring coach or will DW have final say?”
Not to answer for Bradley, but it’s exactly as I suspected. I just heard it out of Dudley’s own mouth on HNIC on Sirius when Jeff Marek asked him “what about the new coach” At the end of the interview. Dudley replied “between Donnie and I we have given about 100 interviews today and we haven’t had time. Tomorrow morning Don and I will sit down…” and then he stopped in mid sentence as I think he realized he was giving up the fact that Don is still in charge on the hockey decisions and he went on to say about how “we’re going to look hard and there’s no hurry etc”
there you have it guys, this isn’t a McKay, this is a PR move to make it look to some like DW isn’t still in charge, but Dudley just admitted he is and starting tomorrow they both are sitting down to together begin to choose our next coach, so status quo with Waddell still in charge, unfortunately.
DJ
April 14th, 2010
6:28 pm
Joe
I heard the same interview and that was not my impression but rather a classy jesture by RD. Let the question be asked directly by AJC but from whatI heard is that Dudley has final say and reports to owners.
Midfield
April 14th, 2010
6:33 pm
It’s been rumored that ASG are looking for ways to get the Thrashers off their books someway, somehow. Is this true, Mark?
phoenix falcon
April 14th, 2010
6:43 pm
@Mavis Beacon
wow, big words from a child molesting, sister screwing , mother licking, monkey looking, white bread and banana eating, meth smoking,single wide trailer living, redneck like yourself. your mother/sister must be proud. why don’t you run alone and go down by the crick, and get possum er supper, don’t forget you have to run over it wit the truck and git it nice and smashed cuz your mother/sister only has the one tooth.
Kristina
April 14th, 2010
6:49 pm
Wow, PHOENIX FALCON. Somebody sure got your goat. That means they must’ve been dead on about something near to your heart. Unfortunately, that close-to-heart attribute apparently isn’t knowledge about pro hockey. Please take your ugliness and your inability to spell over to the Falcons blogs. Today is a breath of fresh air for us Thrashers fans, and we don’t need trolls like you ruining it. Go, Thrashers!
Jon Kincade-680 the Zone
April 14th, 2010
6:49 pm
Bradley-I have forgotten more hockey than you know. The Thrashers are not leaving town. Atlanta Spirit needs them for Phillips. Stick with your UK basketball. You should be worried about the AJC and lack of people reading the paper these days, not the hockey team. I bet the Thrashers stay in business longer than your paper. Call in on the show, if you dare, Thursday and we can discuss. 3-7pm.
Eugene
April 14th, 2010
6:51 pm
Atlanta is going to need to make some wholesale changes. They need to bring in a North American style of hockey. First off, they need a coach who will hold the players accountable. They need a strong character role player to be the voice in the dressing room. Someone like Willie Mitchell would fit perfectly. They need their stars to start playing like Role Players. Nik Antropov is NOT a first line center. He’s a second line center at best but he plays like a schoolgirl. He’s the biggest guy on the ice but he doesn’t use that size of his to get in the corners and stand in front of the net. His job should be to park his big butt in front of that net and don’t move from there. They need to start unloading all their soft players and start building their team around Evander Kane in the same way that the Calgary Flames built their team around Jarome Iginla. Instead of trying to sign expensive free agents which rarely ever pan out, the team needs to devote their resources to scouting. They need to have a better European scouting system like the one Detroit has.
Jon Kincade-680 the Fan
April 14th, 2010
6:51 pm
I fogot which station I was on….
lanier
April 14th, 2010
6:54 pm
4 great season tickets/ 3 years/ $42K never again for me
phoenix falcon
April 14th, 2010
7:14 pm
@Kristina
ummm, this is still America, and i spent 7 years of my life being shot at and shooting at others so you and i and even that other idiot can say what we want( little thing called free speech ). and it’s not an inability to spell, i just thought i would spell it the way he/she would understand. the fact the you responded @ all means something in what i said must have been close to your heart, are you it’s mother/sister? you the chick with the one tooth?
Sgt. Thrash
April 14th, 2010
8:37 pm
Phoenix Falcon:
Why don’t you just shoot yourself, better our society in the process and shut up already, Loser?
This is a HOCKEY blog, Goofy. Take your whining and self-important attitude somewhere else.
fred
April 14th, 2010
9:03 pm
If only you would leave in a year
GetwhatUpayfor
April 14th, 2010
9:10 pm
To hell with Don but a new GM is a 110% improvement.Now put a winner on the Ice.
GT65
April 14th, 2010
9:11 pm
Don is another name for Paul Hewitt. Should have been fire. Both!
tom
April 14th, 2010
9:19 pm
Does anyone really think Waddell will sit in his office and let the GM do his job. Comparing the Mckay scenario does not work because you have an owner that cares and believes. The Thrashers don’t really have an owner. Just a bunch of disfunctional businessmen. Until Waddell is gone, I will not buy a ticket or watch on tv. I don’t know why any credible player in the NHL would want to come to Atlanta.
Admiral Ackbar
April 14th, 2010
9:20 pm
The Thrashers are hard to pull for, much less support. Dudley is a loser. It’s a trap!
Brendan
April 14th, 2010
9:49 pm
Mark Bradley, let me put you on the spot. It’s Draft Day 2010. Dudley wants the U-18 defensemen that NHL scouting has at 10th overall. Waddell wants the Russian kid, Central Scouting has ranked 7th overal, who’s still on the board when the Thrashers draft 8th. Who gets selected?
Did you just say, “Dudley’s guy, since Dudley’s the GM?”
cpsman_atlanta
April 14th, 2010
9:53 pm
OK, so change has been made. More than I could have ever expected, but still, change. That being said, making so many changes so quickly, does that mean that the Thrashers already have crosshairs on another coach? Have they already been talking to others about the head coach position before the current head coach was told, ’see you later’?
Brendan
April 14th, 2010
10:01 pm
Steve, have you ever seen the movie, “Being There,” starring Peter Sellers as Chauncy Gardner? Don Waddell is Chauncy Gardner. “There will be GROWTH in the Spring.” “We must plant now, in firm soil.” And so forth.
Brendan
April 14th, 2010
10:07 pm
See Joe Friday’s 6:22 PM post and Tom’s 9:19 PM post, and Eugene’s 6:51 PM post.
I don’t buy, for a second, that a ‘meaningful change’ has been made. When Waddell cleans out his desk … that’s the moment change, ‘real change,’ has occurred.
scottbravesfan
April 14th, 2010
10:17 pm
Ding dong the witch is dead!!!!!
Finally no more Don Waddell in control of the player personnel!
Dubious
April 14th, 2010
10:30 pm
It is nothing short of amazing that DW is still in a leadership role with the Thrashers after “leading” them to one! playoff birth in 10 years….He must be an incredible guy to not have been jettisoned. Really.
The sad thing is that the two finalists for the GM job back in ‘99 were DW and? Anybody remember? It was Brian Burke. Ever heard of him? Led Vancouver to a good run, then went to Anaheim and won a Stanley Cup and now is rebuilding Toronto. Oh, what might have been.
The importance of selecting the right GM can not be overstated. The Braves were the worst organization in baseball, just awful, not drawing flies, and Schuerholz came in and turned it around almost overnight. Dimitroff looks like a winner, too.
The Thrashers are almost invisible in the Atlanta sporting landscape. Their season ticket renewals will be down again this coming year and , absent something unusual, there will be a continuing decline.
Brendan
April 14th, 2010
10:37 pm
So, the Waddell Administration OFFICIALLY ended with one playoff berth and zero playoff wins? Or … is it more true to say … Waddell’s Administration is still very much in power.
Brendan
April 14th, 2010
10:38 pm
testing?
Brendan
April 14th, 2010
10:40 pm
Mark, can you please rescue my posts. Nothing is posting. I’m starting to feel like Don’s Teflonicity has extended to my blog posts. Nothing sticks.
Delbert D.
April 14th, 2010
10:49 pm
I thought they were the Threshers.
Delbert D.
April 14th, 2010
10:51 pm
Next hockey team in Atlanta (2050?) should be called the Cotton Gins.
PMC
April 14th, 2010
11:50 pm
hamstrung by owners or not. You can’t run a woefully unsuccessful company for 11 years an expect to remain in your job. If anything he should leave and go to a less “toxic” situation elsewhere if his moves aren’t working out. Seriously…he seems respected in the hockey community. Why was he staying in that position for so long? 11 years. Absolutely 0 playoff wins. No success whatsoever… why stay and be the punching bag?
PMC
April 14th, 2010
11:56 pm
Hockey isn’t leaving Atlanta. The NHL really wants this market and the building is built.
It’s not ruined either just needs a shakeup and some interesting inspired play.
Playoff hockey is awesome especially in a series with two even well matched teams…. so the thrashers aren’t in it but I’m still looking foward to the playoffs anyway for both the NHL and NBA. Should be a great year.
gcs
April 15th, 2010
12:12 am
Does AS think we are stupid?
For the Record
April 15th, 2010
2:20 am
Joe Friday:
Tuesday Don was GM with Duds as Asst GM. Wednesday Duds was named GM. So you find it strange that Don and Duds were going to sit down together this morning and discuss the team? In your mind that “proves” that Don is “still in charge on the hockey decisions”? ARE YOU SERIOUS?!?!
Have you ever worked in a corporate environment? Let me explain……Waddell hired Dudley a year ago to do exactly what is happening now. This is not a freak accident or rush decision. IT WAS PLANNED. Get it?
Nobody wants Duds to succeed as GM more than Don. He’s not going to name Duds the new GM on Wed morning and then immediately go off to some groundhog hole while the team has player exit interviews, free agent negotiations, draft priority considerations and a new head coaching position to fill. Get it?
Your “theory” is like Don saying, “OK Duds…Here are all the files and printouts you should need. I have a 1pm tee time. See you in a few weeks. Good luck!” Then he dumps it all on Dudley’s desk and walks out of the building. Would THAT convince you that Dudley’s in charge now? Sorry Joe Friday, but that’s just not how it happens in the Real World. Maybe in your Sirius satellite world, but not here…..
Dudley’s IN CHARGE NOW. Waddell is still his boss, but he’s not going to make the decisions anymore that he did as GM. Both men are professional enough to understand that. Why aren’t you?
THRASHERS FANS REJOICE!!! These moves were made FOR US! This team had multiple open door opportunities to secure a playoff spot and Anderson himself took the blame for not doing it and now he’s gone. SOMEONE WAS HELD ACCOUNTABLE for a change!
Dudley knows what he’s doing. The owners ponied up $101 Million to try and keep Kovy the Figure Skater. If they finance Dudley’s wishes — and there’s hope to believe they WILL — then the Thrashers won’t be a pushover any longer.
This team will WIN, and win often! Mark my words……..
sad brotha
April 15th, 2010
4:58 am
The Braves did the same with their inept Terry McJerk! Stupid is as stupid does!
Pinball34
April 15th, 2010
5:04 am
Another negative hockey piece from Bradley. Please stick to NCAA basketball, sissy boy..
LAC
April 15th, 2010
6:30 am
Gee what a STUPID comment pinball, You are a joke !
Nothing has changed, “don and I will be sitting down to discuss the coaching position”.
Dudley is nothing but a YES man to waddell and waddell is a control freak, who is OUT OF CONTROL and needs to be either in Detroit selling used cars or in Milledgeville in a Mental Hospital for the INSANE, because this clown knows nothing about professional or minor league hockey and
his public speaking skills do not even come close to bin laden.
waddell you need to have a good old beatdown, then you “may” get the picture we ALL Hate your guts and you would LEAVE TOWN and let this franchise try to rebuild from your run of disaster.
Simply put waddell, you are a very very SICK human and you need professional mental assistance as soon as possible, as well as the worthless owners, so got check in to a hospital and check OUT of the Thrashers !
Wristshot
April 15th, 2010
6:55 am
Somebody call Ted Nolan. We have some toughness on the team finally. Old school, blue collar hockey will put butts in the seats. Nolan’s teams were always very fun to watch. It wasn’t fun to have to play the Sabres or Islanders when he was head coach however.
j. naismith
April 15th, 2010
7:39 am
and the thrashers need a team prez – why?
CHIEF OF SMOKE
April 15th, 2010
7:48 am
Still Playoff Tix Available for Hawks/Bucks series.
I know one thing if Thrashers made it to playoffs all games would have been sold out
Brian
April 15th, 2010
7:55 am
Dare I say this is Waddell being “promoted” is more significant than Heatley, Kovalchuk and Hossa leaving?
Brian
April 15th, 2010
7:56 am
Dare I say Waddell being “promoted” is more significant than Heatley, Kovalchuk and Hossa leaving?
String of Incompetence
April 15th, 2010
8:05 am
The string of incompetence continues in Atlanta. In any other city, these guys would have been fired for lack of performance. In Atlanta…….they get promoted!
Pete Babcock >Rich McKay >Entire Atlanta Spirit Group> Billy Knight >Don Waddell
Joe Friday
April 15th, 2010
9:25 am
“Does AS think we are stupid?”
Yep, and apparently some of us are.
EA
April 15th, 2010
10:02 am
Waddell can manage the business side, not the player side. It is a new day in Thrasherville. The Thrashers have so many fans because hockey is a fantastic sport. There are plenty of transplants from other cities that come and support their home team. If the Thrashers win consistently, those fans may start cheering for the city in which they reside. Ilya Kovalchuk is gone. Let’s move on. There is a lot of talent left here along with possible new talent acquired by Dudley to make this team even better. If the AJC jumps on board and writes an occasional positive piece about the Thrashers, some new fans might come see a game. Hockey is no longer expensive in Atlanta. Just check out the deals.
Chris P
April 15th, 2010
11:30 am
Hey Mark, Happy job hunting. The AJC will be gone and the Thrashers will still be lighting the lamp at the Phil. I am sure you thought the Braves only had 1 more year in Atlanta in 1990.
steveh
April 15th, 2010
12:03 pm
Atlanta has a hockey team?
CHIEF OF SMOKE
April 15th, 2010
1:34 pm
steve h,
go buy your Hawka (not Black Hawks) tickets just got e mail for super discount.. Does Atlanta have Basketball team ???
smokemonster
April 16th, 2010
9:04 am
Im the SmokeMonster
smokemonster
April 16th, 2010
9:05 am
SmokeMonster hate basketball. Thinks it for rappers and lowlifes
Cleaning the Bird Poop…. « Chris Collick
April 16th, 2010
1:21 pm
[...] is essential.” (You can see my question and his response in the comments section of his blog post here.) I agree on the teaching aspect, but a great teacher is one who has had plenty of previous [...]
ThrasherFAN
April 16th, 2010
2:37 pm
So what is the point of this article? It didn’t make sense at all! FYI: There are people in Atlanta that DO want the Thrashers to stay here and go to games!!!!