Some may argue it's the coach's job to motivate the players, and to a degree it is. But do you honestly expect Kitchen to give motivational speeches to Keith Tkachuk and Bill Guerin?
He certainly shouldn't need to.
You've got to expect players with over 1,000 games experience to get themselves up for games, and anyone who witnessed the Brett Hull sweater retirement game would agree that this group doesn't appear to be all that interested in winning or losing.
While Andy Murray is a shrewd replacement for Kitchen, don't expect him to get much more from this squad.
Typically, a new coach can coax a couple of early wins out of his new club (see Denis Savard as an example from just within the past few weeks). But the Blues failed to respond to Murray as well, dropping his first two games.
The sooner the fire sale starts in St. Louis, the better. The more players the Blues can move out of town, the better.
For Andy Murray to succeed, he's going to need the kind of legitimate fresh start that Mike Kitchen never had.
For Kitchen, that's not fair... it's just life.
