Barry Trotz firing is right out of Lou Lamoriello’s playbook

Yes, the firing of Barry Trotz touched a nerve Monday. Islanders fans adopted him right from the start, when he opted to coach the team soon after winning a championship with the Capitals. Under Trotz, the Islanders made two stirring playoff runs, including one in 2021 when they kept extending the expiration date on the old barn, Nassau Coliseum.

There was outrage aplenty Monday, much of it understandable.

But if you took a step back, none of this could be termed “surprising.”

It was, in truth, straight out of a quintessential chapter of GM Lou Lamoriello’s playbook. Lamoriello changed coaches eight times in his first 16 years as the Devils’ GM — and won three Stanley Cups in that period with three different coaches (Jacques Lemaire, Larry Robinson and Pat Burns).

Lamoriello has always had an itchy trigger finger. He’s always been a demanding boss. It’s part of why he got along so famously with George Steinbrenner during the brief Yankees-Nets partnership. Steinbrenner is the one who told me once: “Lou would be a winner in any sport he chose to work in because he’s decisive and he’s his own man and he doesn’t give a s–t what you think about it.”

And here’s the thing:

Mostly, Lamoriello’s transactions tend to work out. He fired Robbie Ftorek eight games from the end of the 2000 season with the Devils slumping but still the No. 1 seed in the East. He was roundly criticized for that. However, nine weeks later he was sipping champagne out of the Stanley Cup.

Two years later, Lamoriello unceremoniously canned the man who made that prior move look so brilliant, Larry Robinson.

A certain New Jersey columnist was so outraged by the move he wrote: “Lamoriello … didn’t start firing coaches when Steinbrenner started signing his checks. He has never been the most patient executive in hockey. But he’s never acted like Baby Boss, either. He sure is now.”

Seventeen months later, Lamoriello returned a call the day after the Devils won their third Cup and playfully said when I picked up the phone: “Baby Boss here.”

So Trotz is hardly Lamoriello’s first scalp, and he isn’t the first coach he’s fired with a Cup on his résumé. But this is a different phase of Lamoriello’s career. He will turn 80 in October, and while he has the energy and demeanor of a man 25 years younger, this clearly will be the last profound decision he makes in a career that landed him in the Hockey Hall of Fame 13 years ago.

Lamoriello has never much cared about winning in the court of public opinion, which is good, because he has no shot there with this move.

Post Sports+ members, now you can Text Back at Vac. Get texts from Mike Vaccaro to be the first to know what he’s thinking about the ups and downs in New York sports and text back to share your thoughts. Not a Sports+ member yet? Try it now.

“I believe this group of players needs a new voice,” he said. “I’d rather not get into any of the reasons because that’s my job based upon the information that I have and [my] experience to make these types of decisions.”

“These types of decisions are made for going forward, not for the backward,” Lamoriello added. “With this group we have, and they’re on notice right now, that new voice is necessary to have success. My opinion is what makes these decisions.”

His opinion is why the Islanders installed Lamoriello and essentially gave him complete control of the operation in 2018. That faith was restored in the playoff runs of 2020 and 2021, though you could certainly argue that Trotz was at least equally responsible because Lamoriello was never quite able (or willing) to fully upgrade the franchise’s problem areas.

And look: Lamoriello’s track record is excellent but not perfect. He has a long history of fighting his best players over nickels and dimes. He regrettably installed himself not once but twice as an interim head coach, in 2007 after firing Claude Julien and in 2008 after whacking Robinson for a second time (though his record was 34-14-5).

But we keep coming back to this:

In 35 years as a hockey boss, from Jersey to Toronto to Long Island, he has more hits than misses. He has those three Cups. He was, in fairness, the one who hired Trotz. If he’s wrong here, it’ll be a lousy denouement to a forever career. But bet he’s wrong at your own peril.