Jim Devellano
Jim Devellano ( born 1944 in Toronto, Ontario ) is a Canadian professional ice hockey and baseball official. He has worked in various positions at the Hockey Teams New York Islanders and Detroit Red Wings in the National Hockey League and won with them seven times the Stanley Cup. He is currently Senior Vice - President of the Detroit Red Wings and the Detroit Tigers.
Career
Jim Devellano himself had never played hockey, but in 1967 it became the only just established franchise of the St. Louis Blues of the NHL as a scout on. During his time in St. Louis, he worked among others with the coaches Al Arbour and Scotty Bowman.
1972 moved Devellano to the New York Islanders, who stood before her first season in the NHL. There, too, he took over the job as a scout, but also had influence on the then general manager of the Islanders Bill Torrey. In 1973, when a new coach was sought, it was Devellano who suggested Al Arbour. The team rose under Arbour surprisingly fast becoming a candidate for the Stanley Cup on. In 1979 Devellano the post of general manager of the CHL farm team the Islanders in Indianapolis and led the team until 1981. The New York Islanders had won while in the years 1980 and 1981, the Stanley Cup and Devellano returned in 1981 to the team and was assistant to the General Manager Bill Torrey. Under her leadership, the team won in 1982 the third of four Stanley Cups.
In 1982, the NHL team the Detroit Red Wings by Mike Ilitch bought and Jim Devellano was the summer of 1982, the first person he hired. He got the job as general manager, but the situation in Detroit was not to compare with the Islanders. Detroit had heard in the fifties to the best teams in the NHL, but was degenerated in the sixties and seventies by persistent failures to a gray mouse in the hockey business and carried the derisive nickname " Detroit Dead Wings". Mike Ilitch had Devellano engaged so that he leads the team back to the successes of previous years.
The 1982/83 season not yet brought the turnaround, but in the summer of 1983 Devellano should make a decision should have the decisive effect on the future of the Red Wings. In the NHL Entry Draft in 1983, he showed all his experience he had gained as a talent scout and chose with the first draft pick in his career as general manager of the Red Wings to 18 -year-old Steve Yzerman from. Yzerman was in his first season his skills and was the mid-eighties to the best young stars in the NHL.
1984 built Devellano from the scouting system of the Red Wings and sent scouts to Europe to be there as well watching players. Europeans had not yet encountered in the NHL in each team, which is why this decision of the GM was regarded as particularly innovative. And this step should bear fruit, as the Red Wings hopeful in the coming years, talents, such as Sergei Fedorov, Slava Kozlov, Vladimir Konstantinov Nicklas Lidstrom could undertake or via the Entry Draft.
With the end of the eighties, the Red Wings had re-established itself in the playoffs and were led by Steve Yzerman, who was now captain of the team and one of the superstars of the NHL.
In the summer of 1990 Devellano gave the job from as general manager Bryan Murray and was senior vice president of the Red Wings. In the following years, the team qualified for the playoffs every year, but it was for the ambitious leadership of the Red Wings no progress is occurring, so with a new coach Scotty Bowman was hired in 1993. Devellano wore a large part of this commitment at Bowman's, but both had worked together in the late sixties in St. Louis and can celebrate their separate ways great success in the past 25 years.
1994 Devellano returned to the post of General Manager, before 1997, his desired goal finally reached and the Detroit Red Wings won again after 42 years the Stanley Cup, the captain Steve Yzerman who accepted. After this success took Ken Holland, who had collected as an assistant to Devellano experience a few years, the job as general manager, Devellano again focused on his work as senior vice president.
2001 Devellano was appointed Vice - President of the Detroit Tigers baseball team, which also included Mike Ilitch.
Meanwhile Devellano carrier of 14 championship rings. In addition to the seven Stanley Cup rings, he received three Calder Cup rings and a Riley Cup ring by the Championships the AHL or ECHL farm team from Detroit and two Adams Cup rings through the CHL farm team of the New York Islanders. In addition, a ring comes in baseball by winning the American League championship with the Detroit Tigers.
In his career as General Manager Devellano according to his motto that the foundation for a good team with a very good scouting system and correct decisions in the Entry Draft is placed. The best example he had come with his choice of Steve Yzerman in 1983, who played 23 years for the Red Wings, 20 years, their team captain, was one of the best players in the NHL story is true and the three team Stanley Cup victories led.
In 2010 he was honored with induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Others
Under Devellanos leadership more matured General Manager. Ken Holland inherited him with the Red Wings and Darcy Regier of the Buffalo Sabres and Don Waddell of the Atlanta Thrashers also learned from him.