You’re Mike Sullivan. Those banners hanging from the rafters at PPG Paints Arena are never going away, and they don’t exist without you. You’re 56, a husband, father, grandfather and multimillionaire. You could have pretty much any job around the NHL in a heartbeat.
You’re one of three men to win multiple professional championships in Pittsburgh sports history. Chuck Noll. Danny Murtaugh. And you. You’re on the Mount Rushmore of Pittsburgh coaches.
Life sounds pretty good. And it is.
But then, it’s hard to understand every detail when you don’t walk in another person’s shoes.
So, if you’re Sullivan, other realities must be considered. You haven’t won a playoff series in six years, despite Sidney Crosby still being very close to the height of his powers. Seven years have passed without you drinking Guinness out of the Stanley Cup. Your Pittsburgh Penguins haven’t looked well-coached in the past couple of seasons.
In 2020, you could only watch as trusted assistants Mark Recchi, Sergei Gonchar and Jacques Martin were fired three years after your buddy and confidant Rick Tocchet went to Arizona. Patric Hornqvist, one of you favorite players, was traded. Six months later, general manager Jim Rutherford, whom you consider a close friend, shook the organization when he left town. Less than a year after that, Mario Lemieux and Ron Burkle sold the team. The years went by, and the winning eventually stopped. Then, you had to deal with GM Ron Hextall and president of hockey operations Brian Burke burying your roster into the ground. You genuinely like new GM Kyle Dubas, but even so, you lose associate coach Todd Reirden, and it wasn’t your call. After all these years, you’re surely starting to feel a little isolated.
You probably feel like you’ve lost much of the fan base, too. You have eyes. You have ears. You know how many people are calling for your head.
Oh, you’ve heard it all. Perhaps, in your darkest moments, you’ve even wondered if they’re right. Maybe you’ve questioned yourself.
Then, there’s the media.
You and Dubas don’t agree on everything, so now there’s a “rift” between you two, even though you speak on the phone every morning and have a good working relationship.
There is no right or wrong viewpoint. If you think Sullivan is a great coach and anything but the Penguins’ problem, your opinion is valid and not without reason. If you think it’s time for the Penguins to move on, there is evidence that suggests you’re correct.
Ultimately, the puck is on Sullivan’s blade.
If he wants to remain in Pittsburgh, he has the backing of Dubas and team owner Fenway Sports Group.
If he wants to move on, it would be understandable. It’s becoming harder and harder to visualize these Penguins contending for a championship anytime soon. They’re suffering from the inevitable erosion of age and some bad decisions that expedited their descent.
It’s not a well-guarded secret that NHL teams are floating feelers in Sullivan’s direction. The more the Penguins lose, the hotter a commodity he will become, which is one of hockey’s strange paradoxes. Some of those teams would offer him a raise, too.
So, what does he do?
No one really knows. But my money is on Sullivan returning this season and staying in Pittsburgh for as long as the Penguins will have him.
Sullivan can’t be blamed if he feels isolated or needs a fresh start. Sullivan, however, is immensely loyal.
That brings us to the reason he won’t leave.
When the Penguins hired Sullivan nearly nine years ago, his very first course of action was to schedule meetings with Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang. That night, before the meetings, Sullivan walked to a restaurant looking for dinner. Upon walking into Butcher and the Rye, the first people he saw were Crosby and Letang.
They formed a bond that night, and it has never died.
About 18 months ago, Letang looked me in the eye and said, “Me, Sid, and Geno? We don’t want any other coach. Only him.”
Sullivan feels the same about those three.
In 2015, Sullivan had become a relative no-name on the coaching scene. He was relegated to a decade of assistant coaching and player development gigs, which isn’t bad work, but it wasn’t what he was looking for. A decade earlier, he was a hot-shot coaching prospect and landed a gig guiding his hometown Bruins. He was fired after only two seasons.
You could argue that Crosby, Malkin and Letang saved Sullivan’s career.
Then again, you could argue he saved theirs, too.
After the Penguins won the Stanley Cup in 2009, they were supposed to become a dynasty. Then came playoff losses to the Canadiens, Lightning, Flyers, Bruins, Rangers and the Rangers again.
Crosby, Malkin and Letang were great, but they had become one-hit wonders. At the midway point of the 2010s, there was talk that the Penguins’ core was over the hill and that it wouldn’t win another championship. Sound familiar?
Along came Sullivan, and the Penguins found their way.
Through all these years, loyalty between the coach and the three stars has strengthened. Some will say that loyalty has become detrimental. Maybe. Maybe not.
That loyalty, however, will stop Sullivan from being enticed by another team. He dreams of winning one more championship with the Big Three. Pretty much everyone around the three stars has disappeared. But Sullivan wants to finish the job with his guys the way they started long ago. You can be critical of his coaching. You can be critical of the Penguins. But you have to respect Sullivan’s loyalty. It’s rare in professional sports — almost as rare as walking into a restaurant and running into Crosby and Letang.
Sullivan was meant to be their coach. I believe he intends to be the final coach they ever have.
