By Tim Booth / Associated Press
SEATTLE — Now that he is a couple months into the job, Ron Francis has gained a little more appreciation for the task he signed up for.
The easy decision for the 56-year-old Hockey Hall of Famer would have been to take a consulting or scouting gig, keep his family settled in North Carolina and avoid the kind of challenge that may eventually define his post-playing career.
“It’s not every day you get to build something from scratch, especially in professional sports,” said Francis, the general manager of Seattle’s expansion NHL franchise. “You’ve got a blank canvas, you have the opportunity to build it, create your own culture how you want things to run.”
Francis is in the infancy of his tenure as Seattle’s GM. He was hired in July, more than two years before Seattle will play its first NHL game. For now, Seattle’s hockey braintrust consists primarily of three people: Francis, assistant general manager Ricky Olczyk and director of hockey administration Alexandra Mandrycky. Time is the greatest commodity they have, 24 months before the yet-to-be-named franchise takes the ice for a game that counts. They know that time will disappear rapidly.
“I think for us the biggest thing is not jumping into any sort of rash decisions,” Francis said. “We have some time, let’s make sure we look at it from all the angles and make sure we’re thorough in our approach as we build things out.”
It was a calculated move by Seattle to put together its front office so far ahead of ever playing a game. Long before a team nickname, a naming rights deal for its arena or even a coach is considered, Seattle’s ownership decided it wanted its hockey operations staff to be the first significant moves. They wanted Francis, Olczyk and Mandrycky to have as much time as needed to put together Seattle’s first roster.
That means a significant amount of time spent for all three at this point is gathering information. They’re building a database from scratch. Mandrycky is responsible for developing the analytics Seattle will use in its evaluations. Olczyk handles contracts and the salary cap, and will be responsible for monitoring all the player movement that is likely to take place over the next 18 months and will eventually create the player pool Seattle will pick from.
Francis is watching over it all, building out the infrastructure of the front office while also putting together who will run Seattle’s AHL franchise in Palm Springs. Francis finalized his pro scouting staff last month — including the hiring of Cammi Granato as the only female pro scout currently in the league — and his schedule for the upcoming season will take him all over North America and to Europe.
“There are some surprising parts of him,” team president and CEO Tod Leiweke said. “He’s very much an innovator, fully embracing technology. We were the first team to hire a woman to lead our analytics and he and Alex have just built this solid partnership. His recruitment and hiring or Cammi Granato; he might not have known it but he is a Seattle guy. He fits in so well with what we’re trying to do here.”
There are obstacles to overcome. While other teams have their own databases and scouting reports to draw from, Seattle is starting from scratch. The upside is being able to put it together in a system and format that fits exactly what works for Mandrycky and Francis.
“It’s nice from that perspective, but then you start thinking about everything that has to be done and it’s a little bit daunting,” Mandrycky said. “But that’s why we’re looking to hire a really good team to build that together.”
And again, there is time. Seattle is still 20 months from the expansion draft.
“What’s the most precious commodity we have right now? Time,” Olczyk said. “Take advantage of it.”
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