John Tortorella’s tantrums are relics of an NHL gone by

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It’s a mark of his quality that Philadelphia Flyers head coach John Tortorella has lasted long enough in the NHL that he no longer fits in it.

When he got his first top job at the turn of the millennium, he was just one of many angry alphas behind the bench. The thing that set Tortorella apart from the rest of the herd was the look. Most NHL executives are hicks who’ve bought some sophistication. It’s why they’re always talking about how much they love red wine. Tortorella looked like a sophisticate role-playing a hick.

From the jump, he was standoffish behind the scenes and a screamer in front of them. He had zero impulse control. He seemed to enjoy working himself up to a frothing mania.

That was how things were then. People loved watching a coach go absolutely bananas because one of their players sticked a guy in the face and got called for it.

Tortorella’s career highlights were front loaded. He won a Stanley Cup in Tampa in 2004. That guaranteed that he would never be out of work, even as the league began to change around him.

At every spot he’s gone since, his teams get a little worse. Right now, he’s working a rebuild in Philadelphia. It’s going better than expected, but the Flyers won’t be a viable contender for a while.

On Saturday, they were in Tampa. Tortorella’s Cup-winning team was honoured on its 20th anniversary. No man enjoys being reminded of that time years ago when he still had his mojo. Tortorella seems particularly ill-suited to a fond reminisce.

Ten minutes into the game, with the Flyers trailing 4-0, Tortorella snapped. Referee Wes McCauley ejected him. Then things got interesting.

Tortorella figured out something players and coaches have failed to notice for generations – that being ejected doesn’t mean you have to leave. This is doubly true in hockey. What’s the referee going to do? Climb over the boards and start wrestling you into the tunnel? In skates?

Tortorella stood there screaming. You didn’t need to be a qualified lip reader to figure out what he was saying. The man is a wonderful enunciator.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Tortorella shrieked. (These quotes are about half as long as they should be, because all the f-words have been removed.)

Tortorella’s right hand is in a cast owing to a recent surgery. That lent his performance an invigorating Hanson brothers’ vibe.

Whoever was directing the show had the sense to let the camera linger for on Tortorella’s face, which was slowly turning purple.

“I’m not,” Tortorella repeated several times, presumably at the urging to leave.

Then he changed tactics: “You go.”

This back and forth lasted less than a minute, but it seemed to stretch on forever. There are no good ways to argue with a 4-year-old’s rhetorical style.

The camera panned out as officials approached the bench. Tortorella continued to scream. The Flyers players in front of him stared ahead dolefully. They looked like kids standing around as their dad screams for the manager at a Costco.

Surrounded by his own team, Tortorella was alone. Eventually, the foolishness of this position seemed to occur to him. After one last finger-jabbing blast, he stalked off.

With him went a whole way of being. Tortorella is the last of the NHL wild men.

On Sunday, the NHL suspended Tortorella for two games and fined him US$50,000 for unprofessional conduct directed at officials.

Tortorella has no true contemporaries anymore. Anyone is capable of losing their temper on a given night, but there are no more coaches for whom ‘quick to rage’ is a whole personality.

The ur-NHL coach of the moment is probably Tampa Bay’s Jon Cooper. If Tortorella is an old-school screamer, Cooper is a new-wave explainer. He seems to enjoy telling people what he’s thinking.

In terms of emotional labour, NHL coaches do more than anyone else in sport. They have to carry the whole explaining load because their players are so incredibly boring.

If it were left to the average NHLer to sell the league off the ice, hockey would be down there with netball and World Series of Poker repeats. Instead, coaches do that work. They tell you what’s happening. They pick the fights. They make the promises. When things go wrong, they absorb the anger.

They’re well recompensed for their work, but still. If you’re the type of person inclined to type your own name into Reddit, you could easily go mad.

Tortorella comes from a time when this work was spread throughout the team. Everyone was at the emotional edge all of the time. A good coach, a Mike Keenan-type, personified this kill ‘em all mentality. The more intense the coach, the more intense his team.

Then the NHL got rid of fighting and put Sidney Crosby in charge. Bulging eyeballs were out and self-containment was in. Freaking out over little things didn’t tell people you cared. It showed you were not in control.

Now the league is dominated by simmering, cerebral, Jon Cooper types. Most of them are interchangeable, which the league encourages. You don’t want the help getting airs and thinking it’s as big as the talent.

Coaches have always been fired, but it used to be a story. Nowadays, outside of a few major markets, it hardly merits a discussion. You can’t blame people. Once they’re not wigging out every once in a while, it is hard to tell the NHL’s team bosses apart. They all look and talk and act the same.

Thinking about it makes you grateful for Tortorella. He may be ridiculous, but this is an entertainment business. The goal should not be disappearing into the wallpaper.

The NHL needs people willing to make themselves the story. Too few players want to do it. The Tortorellas remind us of a time when a hockey game was a 2½-hour brawl, with or without fists, in February as well as April, regardless of who was playing whom.

Watching Tortorella, 65, walk off after making himself the most interesting story on a slow Saturday night, you already missed him. Soon, there won’t be any like him left and the league will be much the lesser for it.