Carolina Hurricanes: Tom Dundon’s 1-Year Report Card, Part Two

Hiring Decisions

Here is where some of the harshest criticisms for Tom Dundon come. After failing to make a trade at last season’s deadline that could help push the team into ending their playoff drought, General Manager Ron Francis was asked to step down from his role as GM and serve as the President of Hockey Operations instead. A month later, once the season was deemed over, he was officially terminated. Head Coach Bill Peters declined the optional final year of his contract to go and coach in his home province of Alberta with the Calgary Flames.

Without a GM or a Head Coach, Tom Dundon and the Carolina Hurricanes embarked into what seemed like a new adventure. Anyone with any experience should be able to do a better job than those two, who combined for a perfect 0.500 record over the years. It should have been easy enough to find qualified replacements, especially with the excellent talent that this team had on the books. Don Waddell, named interim GM, was tasked with finding replacements that Tom Dundon would agree to.

Months rolled by with no movement. Rumors of different individuals being interviewed came and went without avail. Suddenly, last May, both positions were filled simultaneously. While that sounded good, what took fans aback was the fact that they were filled internally. Assistant Coach Rod Brind’Amour was named as the new Head Coach while Waddell simply removed the interim label from his title.

With Dundon being a businessman by trade and the two hires being internal, the immediate response from the fan base was that Dundon was becoming more like Karmanos and pinching pennies. Naturally Dundon denied that accusation, stating that he believed that they were the best available personnel for the positions. Now, neither Don Waddell nor Rod Brind’Amour have completed a full season in their positions. We have already graded Brind’Amour at the half season mark. We will know how well these decisions were made by the end of the season.

So far Waddell has yet to impress the fan base. His first draft pick, Andrei Svechnikov, was an easy selection to make after the Carolina Hurricanes moved up to the second draft pick via the draft lottery. The same day, he committed a blockbuster deal with the Calgary Flames to bring in Dougie Hamilton and Micheal Ferland in exchange for Noah Hanifin and Elias Lindholm. The Hurricanes also received the rights to prospect Adam Fox.

There have been other moves as well. Some good, such as claiming Curtis McElhinney off waivers or signing Calvin de Haan. Others have been oh so bad. The worse offender was the trade that saw Jeff Skinner shipped off to Buffalo for table scraps in the form of Cliff Pu and a pair of draft picks, a trade that continues to haunt this fan base everyday as Skinner continues to be a top tier goalscorer for the Sabres, second in scoring only to Alex Ovechkin in the NHL.

Many believe that had Dundon been more patient and his pocketbook more loose, there might have been better options on the market. Coach Barry Trotz left the Stanley Cup-winning Washington Capitals and went to fill a void with the New York Islanders. Perhaps there could have been a way to coax him to the Carolina Hurricanes. For some reason, Dundon landed on Don Waddell and Rod Brind’Amour, for better or for worse. For now, the results are not good enough for a playoff spot. Perhaps the future will be different, but we aren’t grading the future.

GRADE: C-

Questions for CC Readers:

How would you grade Dundon on in-game experience or his hiring practices? Did you have an especially good or bad in-game experience (outside of on-ice performance) that you would like to share? How do you feel about the hiring of Waddell and Brind’Amour in their respective roles?