Did players come to him with their concerns? Was he aware the way Babcock was treating people wasn’t appropriate? “I’ve been a manager for 22 years and had Scotty Bowman, Dave Lewis, Mike Babcock, Jeff Blashill (Detroit) and now Tip (Dave Tippett) here as coaches and at the end of the year I always do exit interviews. “I can’t speak for Johan Franzen but he was very clear (recently) that he thought Mike Babcock was a tremendous coach but he doesn’t like him as a person. There was another incident years earlier when Chelios was still playing where a San Jose broadcaster said the Wings players had little time for Babcock.

Source: National Post December 05, 2019 00:45 UTC