Mike O’Connell has held many titles throughout his post-playing career. He began as a head coach for the San Diego Gulls of the International Hockey League. From there he has been a General Manager, Pro Scout, Player Development Consultant and a Senior Advisor to the GM. He comes to the Flyers in a similar role as the Senior Advisor once more as well as having a role in Player Development.
When it came to making the decision to leave the Kings, it was coming closer to home that drove O’Connell. To be able to do his job correctly, it would’ve meant spending more time in Los Angeles. Being in this business means potentially missing a lot of stuff in regards to family so he made the decision to simply stop missing so much.
O’Connell spent 15 seasons with the Los Angeles Kings where he held a variety of those titles within the organization. He helped develop players such as Alec Martinez, who scored the Kings’ cup-clinching goal back in 2012. After a playing career of over 850 games, O’Connell was finally able to bring the Stanley Cup home in 2012 and 2014, something that eluded him while he played.
When O’Connell was first brought into the Los Angeles organization, then GM Dean Lombardi gave him a hands on opportunity with player development that wasn’t really done before. It was previously up to the AHL staff to work on development and getting players to the next level. This allowed O’Connell to work hands on with these players in a different type of situation than they were used to. He was able to build relationships and earn trust without directly having an impact on their playing time.
And that was one of the biggest things O’Connell took away from his time in Los Angeles. Building relationships with the players both on and off the ice helped grow the trust between both parties. Creating a trusting relationship allows the player to be able to rely on you when things aren’t going their way.
"“Understanding their game, understanding where they are in their career. Understanding where their weakness and their strengths are. Start with their strengths through positive reinforcement, just basically your relationship. So when it gets to those certain times when it’s a difficult time for the players, they’re going through a tough time either with the coach or in their career or with their confidence level, they can rely on you to help pull them through.”"
Every player will be different and what works for one may not work for another. So it’s about finding how to help each individual player the best that you can. That is the experience he is hoping to be able to bring to the Flyers along with helping the team to win as many games as possible.
Development camp will wrap up this afternoon with a 3-on-3 scrimmage and then it will become time to get ready for the main camp later in the month. And while O’Connell has only been here a short time, he has had the opportunity to see a numerous amount of the Flyers young prospects up close. That has given him some early insight into what can be expected of those young players as well as what they need to work on moving forward.