You know, I was thinking about this subject last night. Remember when Torts was in Tampa? Or maybe before that when he won a Calder Cup in Rochester in the 90s? He was a cutting edge strategist who pioneered a puck pressure style of defense that created turnovers at a similar rate as the various neutral zone trap styles that had turned the NHL into a giant quagmire, but still offered the players some freedom of movement that made the game a little bit more fun and entertaining. Laviolette was an early acolyte and between the two of them they showed that you could win in the NHL with smarts, speed and skill ... in addition to bludgeoning opponents and boring fans to death.
He won his Cup playing that way. And then Lavy won the next (available) season playing a very similar style and between those wins and the rules enforcement changes following the 2005 lockout, we saw a new age of hockey emerge ... which brought us the swashbuckling generation of younger guys in the game today, especially the Americans where Torts and Lavy had an over-sized impact on the feeder systems because they were routinely coaching the national teams of the early to mid 00s. Speed and skill started to matter as much as tree trunk thighs in the draft rankings. Smaller forwards and (gasp) even smaller defensemen were given room to develop so long as they had the speed to push the pace of the game, and then the salary cap put a premium on entry level contracts and we got to see all that young skill in the NHL on an accelerated schedule.
And then Torts went to New York to coach the Rangers and let the pressure (and the famously combative NY press corps) turn him into just another bitter old fart who would rather trap the opponent into a mud pit to ensure a good shot at the loser point than risk opening up the flow of the game a bit. His next job in Columbus sealed the deal, and his transformation into a trap man was complete. 14 or 15 years on and he's basically turned into Jacques Martin or Ken Hitchcock with a better mustache and snappier comebacks. What an effing waste.
