Don Waddell, the Blue Jackets’ new president/general manager, has been a part of more than 3,200 professional hockey games as a player, coach or executive with 13 teams across four leagues. At different junctures in his career, Waddell has held dual titles of player/assistant coach, coach/general manager and president/general manager. He has served USA Hockey in myriad capacities.
Waddell knows how to build a roster, and he knows how to load a bus.
Dean Evason, the Blue Jackets’ new coach, has been a part of more than 2,400 games as a player, coach or assistant with 11 professional teams across four pro leagues. This is not counting his six years as a junior coach in the WHL. He has had a mullet hanging out of the back of his helmet. He has worn a flat top behind the bench.
Together, Waddell and Evason have 75 years of professional hockey experience, with more than 50 of those years at the NHL level. And if you throw in assorted other waystations – such as Waddell’s two years as a scout with the Pittsburgh Penguins and the year Evason spent, late in his playing career, with the Canadian National Team – they’ve been a part of nearly 6,000 games in their pro careers.
They’ve played and/or coached in the old IHL and the old CHL as well as the AHL, the NHL and the Swiss and German leagues. In alphabetical order, the teams they’ve been associated with are/were:
Atlanta Thrashers, Augsburg EV, Binghamton Whalers, Calgary Flames, Carolina Hurricanes, Dallas Stars, Detroit Red Wings, Flint Generals, Flint Spirits, Harford Whalers, Houston Apollos, Landshut EV, Los Angeles Kings, Milwaukee Admirals, Minnesota Wild, New Haven Nighthawks, Orlando Solar Bears, Saginaw Gears, San Jose Sharks, San Diego Gulls, Toledo Goaldiggers, Tulsa Oilers, Washington Capitals, Zug EV.
Rarely has either of them experienced ultimate victory.
Waddell was the one of the final cuts for the 1980 U.S. Men’s Olympic Team. He broke his leg in a pre-tournament game. Team U.S.A. went on to perform the Miracle on Ice.
Waddell played one NHL game, with the L.A. Kings against the New York Rangers on Jan. 28, 1981. He won the Turner Cup, which went to the champions of the IHL, as a defenseman with the Saginaw Gears in 1981. He was a player/coach with the Flint Spirits when the Spirits lost in the Turner Cup final in 1988.
Waddell was an assistant GM with the Red Wings when they won the Stanley Cup in 1998.
He’ll always have that.
Evason as a junior starred for a Kamloops Junior Oilers team that won the WHL championship in 1984. He turned pro later that year. He was the 33-year-old captain of Team Canada at the 1997 IIHF World Championships. They won the gold medal.
Essentially, those are the bookends of his playing career.
Evason was one of those guys who punched above his weight and extended his career longer than one might have thought. He played 803 games over 12-plus seasons in the NHL. A bottom-six center, he had 139 goals, 372 points – and exactly 1,000 penalty minutes.
Evason was a regular on 10 playoff teams. Eight of them did not get out of the first round. The other two didn’t make it past the second.
Evason as a coach was an assistant on Capitals teams that weren’t in the same strata as the Red Wings, Penguins or Blackhawks. His AHL Milwaukee Admirals teams won a lot of games but never got past the first round of the playoffs. When he got his first shot as an NHL head coach, his Minnesota Wild teams overachieved – they went 147-77-27 over four years despite a roster inflexibility due to $13 million in dead cap space – but they never won a playoff series.
Waddell built three expansion teams from scratch – San Diego and Orlando of the IHL and the Atlanta Thrashers of the NHL. In Columbus, we appreciate the difficulty of building from scratch. During the six years Waddell served as GM in Carolina, he built a Stanley Cup contender. The Hurricanes were 278-130-44 during his five-plus years running hockey ops in Raleigh. They won three division titles, but every spring their playoff runs were stopped by a better, or a hotter, team (Boston, Tampa Bay, New York Rangers, Florida).
Waddell will turn 66 on Aug. 19. Evason will turn 60 on Aug. 22. They are on the outer edge of Leo, the fiery king of the celestial jungle, and on the cusp of sharp-minded Virgo, and the promise of harvest.
They have lived long, rich hockey lives. What have they learned?
Evason said, “We don’t have enough time to talk about everything I need to get better at.”
They have learned humility, among other things. Perhaps it comes from understanding what it takes to win the ultimate prize, chasing it for decades and falling short. Such repeated chastening tends to lead to self-awareness for those who choose to think.
Waddell said, “No individuals in hockey have success without the team having success. That’s critical to me.”
Neither sounds like Mike Babco*ck.
I think 71-year-old John Davidson, who made it to the Stanley Cup final as a Rangers goaltender in 1979 and lost, made a good choice in Waddell. I think Waddell made a good choice in Evason.
While there is something to be said for a younger dynamic, there is little doubt that these men know who they are, what they want to do and how they will try. It is clear there is a passion that still burns within them.
They were drawn to Columbus because they see the potential and, as well, they can understand what “long-suffering” means to the fans here. They may not get the Blue Jackets to the promised land, but in the twilight of their careers they believe, fervently, that they know the way.
Let us see now.
marace@dispatch.com
