Chris MacFarland's Early Assessment of the Nashville Predators and the One Question He Needed Answered
On Wednesday Chris MacFarland was introduced as the newest General Manager and President of Hockey Operations and shared the one question he needed answered before taking the job.
After a four month search, the Nashville Predators introduced the new President of Hockey Operations and General Manager Chris MacFarland on Wednesday. MacFarland most recently served as the GM of the Colorado Avalanche helping build the 2022 Stanley Cup winning roster and the President’s Trophy team of the 2025-26 season.
MacFarland takes the reins at a critical time for the franchise. The Predators have missed the playoffs their last two seasons and haven’t moved beyond the first round of the postseason since the 2017-2018 Presidents Trophy winning season. Even with big offseason signings under Barry Trotz, Nashville remains firmly in the mushy middle…at best.
There is plenty of work ahead for Chris MacFarland. Wednesday’s press conference offered insight into the hiring process, MacFarland’s biggest question for the Predators, and his initial assessment of the franchise.
Top target
Majority owner Bill Haslam revealed that MacFarland was a top target for the position from the start of the GM search.
Initially the Predators hired the firm CAA to help in the process. While CAA stepped away shortly after the search began, the company’s early work immediately caught the attention of Haslam and the hiring committee.
“They gave us an initial list of people and when they did I looked and I said, ‘Wow, if we could get Chris MacFarland that would be terrific’.”
That was the consensus from a number of NHL executives Haslam spoke with during the process.
“I said, ‘If you were me, who would you go get?’ And Chris’s name came up time and time again from the very best people in the league.”
“They all said the exact same thing.”
MacFarland had a year remaining on his contract with the Avalanche. It was evident that Colorado would make a deep playoff run, so Haslam used the time to investigate and interview other potential candidates. Once Colorado’s postseason wrapped up, Joe Sakic granted MacFarland permission to talk to the hiring committee in Nashville and a deal was made relatively quickly.
“When we finally could talk to Chris, we immediately took every advantage to jump in there quick with a conversation, because I knew that we would have an opportunity, but it wasn’t a given thing that he would like us.”
It seems Colorado wanted to keep MacFarland but weren’t able to match the opportunity and offer from Nashville. While details of the deal haven’t been made public, it is rumored to be a financially substantial six year contract.
MacFarland’s one question for Nashville
While the hiring committee had plenty of questions for MacFarland, he had one very important question he needed answered right away.
“I said, ‘Mr. Haslam, is the goal here to make the playoffs, make a wild card, feel good about that, and high five each other? Or is the goal here to build a team that can compete and try to bring a Stanley Cup to Broadway?’”, MacFarland shared.
“And he didn’t hesitate. ‘The goal here is to try to win.’ And that’s really quite honest, that’s all I needed to hear.”
Assessing the Predators
MacFarland’s first step is to assess the Predators in their current iteration. Does he see this as a team close to contention with some roster tweaks or is this a team that needs to step back from some veteran contracts and play a long game back to relevance?
MacFarland admits he has a lot of work to do to answer that question succinctly, but he was frank about how he views the process of becoming a consistently competitive franchise in the league.
“Sometimes there’s short term pain. Sometimes there’s - and I’m not even sure it’s pain. I, for me, it’s just part of the journey. It’s part of the process to building a team that can win consistently and have a chance,” MacFarland said.
“We’re not where we want to be,” MacFarland said.
MacFarland has a working knowledge of the Predators roster and prospects but will be spending time learning more about what Nashville has in house. He said the players will let him know exactly who this team is with their play on the ice.
“I’m going to need time to poke around under the hood here and to truly get a feel for that,” MacFarland said of the current state of the franchise.
“Some of it might not come until the fall and rookie camp and training camp and the start of the season. I always say at least the players will tell us how the season starts where we’re at.”
“We’re going to look to get better,” MacFarland said. “How quick that happens, again the players will dictate that.”
MacFarland pointed out that Colorado’s return to contention happened incrementally and not with one or two big, sweeping moves. He referred to the process as “small step by small step”.
“Sometimes that takes time, and sometimes that take honesty about where you’re at in an organization - honesty with the players and the coaches and the fans and the narrative to the people, the Preds fans,” MacFarland said.
Acquiring top talent
MacFarland left a franchise that drafted top talent like Nathan McKinnon, Cale Makar, and Gabriel Landeskog via high draft picks. Nashville’s new GM understands the long game of drafting and developing top talent.
“These guys usually aren’t traded, right?” MacFarland said. “You usually have to go through some pain to get those guys in the draft, and the acquisition cost on those types of guys in the marketplace is astronomical, to be quite frank.”
“The true franchise player is usually drafted, and it’s usually going through some organizational - I don’t like the word pain, again, it’s just part of the journey, right?”
That doesn’t mean MacFarland is already committed to the “tank for a top pick” philosophy for Nashville. He acknowledged that even with a top pick, franchise changing talent isn’t always available in every draft.
As he learns the strengths and weaknesses of the roster and prospect pool, MacFarland is committed to using that information to make the best moves for the future.
“What I can say is, whether it’s a trade, a free agent, or whatever, we will leave no stone unturned. I think you can build a competitive team that can win hockey games and be dangerous in different ways, and we will be ready.”
“If there is an opportunity to strike from the outside, we’ll have done the work, we’ll be prepared, we’ll have the information and be ready to go,” MacFarland said.
“There’s a lot of different ways to skin the cat.”
Next steps
MacFarland will spend the next few days meeting with the coaching and hockey ops staff.
“I’ll talk to [Brunette] today or tomorrow and we’ll get a feel for things,” MacFarland said.
He knows Andrew Brunette from the scouting circles and had Derek McKenzie and Luke Richardson as players during his Columbus days.
“I’m going to call all those guys this week. I’m going to meet with Jeff Kealty and Scott Nichol and the staff,” MacFarland said.
The introductory press conference is out of the way. Conversations with staff and players are up next, and MacFarland has just a few weeks to prepare for the NHL draft.
It’s been a long interview process for Nashville but a quick turnaround for MacFarland. Nashville’s newest President of Hockey Ops and GM is looking forward to this new opportunity.
“It was going to take a hell of an opportunity and situation to get me to think about leaving Colorado,” MacFarland said.
“I’m super excited to get to work.”