The Detroit Red Wings begin training camp this Friday at Centre Ice Arena in Traverse City. Griffinshockey.com caught up with new Grand Rapids Griffins head coach Ben Simon before he headed up north.

How did you spend your summer? You have mentioned that you use the summer for time with your wife and two daughters.
It’s just making up for lost time during the season and hanging out during the summer. We have a little cottage south of here and catch up with the family. I went home to Cleveland a couple times to see my parents and my brothers. Not a whole lot, just catching up on family time and actually sitting with the girls and watching them grow up a little bit.

Development camp after the NHL Draft in June was sort of your first go-round as head coach of the Griffins. How would you assess that week?
It was fun for me because it helps get the rust off a little bit, since I hadn’t been a head coach in four years. Nelly (former Griffins head coach Todd Nelson) gave us a lot of empowerment where he’d let us run practices every now and again, but it’s a different vantage point and different perception from the players. I think it was important for me to get the rust off and have that perception from the players established: I’m no longer an assistant, I’m the head guy. That was important. Getting to know some of these young kids was big, too. I’ve known a lot of them for a little bit, but some of these younger kids coming through the pipeline will be here in two or three years.

You hired a couple of assistant coaches this summer. Let’s start with Matt Macdonald. You worked with him with Cincinnati in the ECHL?
I worked with Matt in Cincinnati for one year. When I took over there (as head coach) he was the assistant before. For me, I didn’t know much about the ECHL and he knew a lot of the nooks and crannies, and the idiosyncrasies of the league. For me to have a guy like him with his experience at that level was huge for me and helped me really just focus on the hockey side of things. Throughout the year with Matt, I got to know him, his family, his personality and his approach to the game with his relationship with the players, and how he sees the game. He’s a former defenseman, he’s a great communicator and he’s a really good teacher.

When the opportunity came up to hire an assistant here I didn’t want him to be hired because he was a buddy of mine. I wanted him to be hired because he’s a good coach. He had been an assistant coach in the ECHL for two years, head coach for four and had some solid years in Cincinnati. I told Ryan (Martin) and Ken (Holland) I wanted him to get the job on his own two legs. I said ‘Ryan, why don’t you talk to Matt first and if you like him then we’ll go further down the road. But if you don’t like him, I don’t want there to be any sense of favoritism so to speak.’

Matt did very well in the interview process. His personality is fantastic and I think he’ll be great for our young defensemen. He’ll be working with the penalty kill and the defensemen predominately.

Another assistant, Brad Tapper, is a guy you won a couple of championships with as a player. (2001 IHL Turner Cup with Orlando, 2002 Calder Cup with Chicago.)
I played with Tapps my first two and a half, three years pro, and then fast forward probably nine years further, and we ended up playing for the same team in Germany, Iserlohn. I’ve sweat with Brad, I’ve worked with Brad on the ice as a player. But I knew Brad as a player, not as a coach. Life goes on and you lose contact with some guys and when this job opportunity came up, he reached out. I totally forgot about him, so it was a good way for me to reconnect with him initially. He had been an assistant coach in the ECHL for a long time, then an assistant in the American League for Chicago, for Rochester and then down to Adirondack to be a head coach. There’s no wrong or right path for a coach but there are a lot of similar parallels with his career as to mine.

Again, with Ryan, I didn’t want there to be a sense of ‘this is a guy that I know.’ I wanted him to get the job on his own merit and his own background, and he did a great job throughout the interview process. He’s played the game at a high level, he was a goal scorer when he played, he’s got a very offensive minded way of looking at the game and he’s a good worker. I’m looking forward to working with him. He’ll be working with the forwards and power play.

Are there parallels between how a person played and how they coach?
Just because you’re a phenomenal player doesn’t mean you’re going to be a phenomenal coach. And I don’t think because you’re a terrible player you’re going to be a terrible coach. It’s good to draw on your experiences both good and bad and to use those experiences to help convey to these players that, hey, we’re not that far removed from the game, and to learn from our mistakes and to use our experiences that were positive to help these guys along.

The roster is not close to being set, but can you comment on just the pool of players that will be eligible for Grand Rapids this season?
Detroit has always done a phenomenal job of, I won’t say stocking, but putting good veteran players down here to help the younger players develop. Now that being said, there’s a lot of opportunity that’s available in Detroit right now, so I don’t want to say ‘he’s going to be here, he’s going to be here’ because you never know. Up top, they’ve got an open mind.

The old philosophy in Detroit was the tie goes to the veteran, the older guy. Now I think if it gets to a close fight between a younger guy and a vet, they’re going to try to find a way to help that young guy in a rebuild to make Detroit. There’s a lot of opportunity in Detroit, but in terms of guys who could be here, we’re looking at some guys that have great offensive capabilities. We’re going to be a little bit young defensively and we’ll have to learn quickly.

How excited are you for the start of training camp?
There’s always that rejuvenation. It’s a new season, it’s fresh, everyone’s got a clean slate. It’s the excitement of the new year and a new beginning for everyone. It’s another season but it’s another adventure with a different group of guys; that’s always exciting. The adventure, that’s what you remember the most. It’s not the wins and losses, it’s the people and the players along the way, and the learning mistakes and the learning accomplishments.

Photos by Sam Iannamico