Don Waddell
Don Waddell
Donald Douglas Waddellis the former, and last President of the Atlanta Thrashers and a former professional ice hockey defenseman. He is currently President of Gale Force Sports & Entertainment, parent company of the Carolina Hurricanes of the National Hockey League...
coming good guys players positives talk transition
We all talk about how we've been in a transition period. ... We have a lot of good young players and a lot of guys coming in, and we can take the positives out of that.
assess camp candidates continue evaluation however makeup olympic opportunity potential process staff step team terrific together
The orientation camp will be a terrific opportunity for our staff to come together with the candidates for our Olympic team to assess the potential makeup of our squad. It will not be a tryout camp as the evaluation process will continue through the first part of the NHL season, however it will be an important first step in the process.
blow start
We're out of the tournament, but it's not like we have to blow it up and start over.
bad brian deserved fit guys looking performed player rating system year
We did a rating system all year and these guys deserved to be here. It wasn't that Brian was a bad player or anything than that it was just that these guys performed better and these guys were a better fit for what we were looking for.
bring excitement exciting guys players
We have 12 players that have never competed in the Olympics. That's exciting because these guys have never been through this before and they'll bring a lot of excitement to the game.
behind emotion emotions expect game goes happen players realize scenes
It's very disappointing. Sometimes players in the emotion of the game don't realize everything that goes on behind the scenes that need to happen to make these tournaments happen. As a player, I don't expect them to know that.
hockey people pressure top tremendous usa
It's very disappointing, because the people at USA Hockey do a tremendous job. There is a lot of pressure on people. The top people at USA Hockey are volunteers.
best dressed felt four home practical remain ryan
It's not practical to have four goaltenders dressed for practice, so we felt it best to have Ryan remain at home and be available.
ability advantage affect either finish mostly pick players playoffs positively team until wait year
It's to everybody's advantage if we could just wait until the playoffs are over or mostly over. That way you don't want to affect any player's ability with their team right now either positively or negatively. If the players could finish the year out and then we could pick the team that would be ideal.
depth nice team
The nice thing about our team is that our depth is so much better. And our goaltending will be strong.
change system
The new system doesn't change much for the top-end players, because they are still going to get paid.
came easy guys judge sit step
It's easy to sit up there and judge and say, what if we did this or that. What I came away with as being encouraging ... was we had a lot of guys step up and play big in the big games.
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I told him that 3 1/2 years with one franchise is pretty good in today's world. Coaches tend to get fired as soon as teams lose a few games.
begin camp process season
The process will begin when the season begins. This is an orientation camp, it's not a tryout camp that we're having.