Melrose fired by Lightning; mullet to coach team for rest of year

TAMPA BAY, FL — The Tampa Bay Lightning have reportedly fired head coach Barry Melrose after a 5-7-4 start in the coach’s second season, replacing him with Barry Melrose’s mullet.

“Barry Melrose has been a subpar coach for this team, and we felt it was time for a change,” said Bill Davidson, the owner of the Tampa Bay Lightning. “We felt that Barry had become predictable and boring, with very little creativity. But the mullet … the mullet has a mind of its own.”

Davidson continued: “We expect that the mullet will be both bad and good for us, but it will be exciting. Some days I’m sure we’ll come in and look at the mullet and go, ‘You’re awesome, you’re totally sweet and hilarious and doing great work,’ and other days we’ll be like, ‘Seriously? A mullet? Gross and retarded.’ But the one thing we know for sure is that mullet is going to bring some excitement and hope to the Lightning.”

This is not the first time that a hairdo has coached a professional sports franchise. Jimmy Johnson’s hair won a Super Bowl with the Dallas Cowboys in 1994, long after Johnson had left the team.

Melrose said he was disappointed to be let go, but that he wishes his mullet the best.

“Listen, coaching hockey is hard, and so I hope my mullet will be up to the challenge,” Melrose said. “My mullet is a brilliant and noble institution, however, so I think it’ll be fine.”

Special thanks to robtraut for the headline idea on Twitter.

It’s going to be tough for this sport to sweep any nations, but it’s still pretty frickin’ cool!