Edmonton Oilers are reportedly set to hire Mike Babcock as their new head coach after firing Kris Knoblauch last season. The latest development has brought to light the concerns regarding the conduct of Babcock while coaching over the years in the NHL.

Jay Onrait, the host of SportsCentre on TSN, asked their reporter Ryan Rishaug about how risky the potential hiring of Mike Babcock from the Oilers could turn out to be.

“I view it as fairly risky,” Rishaug responded, to start off the discussion on Babcock likely to join Edmonton. “The risk here is that every other team that’s passed on Mike Babcock over all these years has been right. And then, in this moment, the Edmonton Oilers are wrong, that’s the risk.”

Although no team has officially confirmed passing on the chance to hire Babcock in their coaching setup, he has mostly been out of a job in the NHL since 2019.

“I don’t believe that they [Edmonton Oilers] would want any part of the coach that was capable of pulling off some of those things that Mike Babcock, very well documented, has pulled,” the TSN reporter said on SportsCentre about the risk attached to Babcock.

The Columbus Blue Jackets did bring him in as head coach in 2023, but he had to resign from the position without taking charge of a game due to alleged bad behavior. It has been widely reported that three years ago, he allegedly asked the Blue Jackets players to show pictures on their phones.

In his first season as the Toronto Maple Leafs head coach in the 2015-16 season, he humiliated then-rookie Mitch Marner in front of his teammates.

Since Babcock considered Marner lazy, he asked the teenage Canadian to list his teammates from hardest-working to laziest. He listed himself at the bottom, along with veterans like Nazem Kadri and Tyler Bozak, to agree with Babcock’s sentiment of considering him lazy.

While the matter should have finished then since Marner made the list in confidence, Babcock leaked it to his teammates to cause a major situation.

NHL clears Mike Babcock of alleged conduct in their investigation

​On Thursday, June 18, the NHL sent out a press release on their website to clear Mike Babcock of “certain alleged conduct” after completing their investigation. The NHLPA had requested them to find out why exactly he resigned as head coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets.

They did it after learning about the interest shown by the Edmonton Oilers to sign Babcock as their head coach.

“The League has completed its review of Mike Babcock's tenure in Columbus, and of certain alleged conduct associated therewith. Our investigation has concluded that, even in a light least favorable to Mr. Babcock, there is no current basis to restrict his employment in the League,” the official statement from the NHL on the matter read.

Before the NHL clearance came through, TSN reporter Ryan Rishaug alluded to how the Oilers-Babcock relationship might work. He stated that there is a chance for them if the 63-year-old makes a lasting change in his behavior.

“With all that said, to be fair, if he has changed, if he [Mike Babcock] truly does look back on all that and go ‘I need to be better than that. I can’t be doing that anymore,’ this has the chance to work. But it’s risky,” he remarked.

Will the potential hiring of Mike Babcock as head coach work for the Edmonton Oilers in light of his indifferent behaviour as a professional? Please share your thoughts on the matter in the comments.

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Written by

Arjun Sharma

Edited by

Kaamna Dwivedi