“But one of the things I had heard was that this year, they just felt like, even the best players felt, they needed to be put back in their place sometimes. That maybe they had too much say, too much control, and they needed somebody who was going to say, ‘no, you guys are great players, but I’m the boss and I’ll make the decisions’.

“And Cassidy, for example, is not a guy who’s afraid to do that. And they interviewed Berube. And they interviewed Laviolette. I heard Laviolette was there last week and interviewed very well. I think they interviewed Jim Hiller. I’m sure they interviewed some other people. But, I’ve heard that the players recognize that they probably needed somebody who would tell them ‘no’ more often. And that’s how we got to Babcock.”