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Then, we have the actual facts of the matter. If you care more about results than intent, let’s just say Tocchet’s résumé isn’t as colorful.
Despite being an NHL head coach for nine seasons, Tocchet has only appeared in the playoffs twice, with just one series victory to his name (excluding the 2020 Qualifying Round). He might’ve won the Jack Adams Award in 2023–24, but he’s suffered the same fate behind the bench that the Flyers have as a team over the past decade-plus— being stuck in the murky middle.
Furthermore, most of the league’s bench bosses have had a tremendous single-season success as a head coach at some level. Whether it be in juniors, college, or a professional league, most of these guys have led a team the distance, or close to it. However, that’s not the case for Tocchet—it makes him an outlier. He won back-to-back Stanley Cups as a n assistant with the Pittsburgh Penguins, but that’s just not the same.
Tocchet’s teams haven’t been statistically dominant under the hood, either. He’s taken on tough jobs with the aforementioned Canucks, Arizona Coyotes, and Tampa Bay Lightning, but the Flyers won’t be much easier, will they?
At this stage, fans are left hoping Tocchet is the guy. There’s no hard evidence to say he is.
Remember how hard the Flyers/Comcast media pushed Torts “fictional” accountability and being “hard to play against” (old time Flyers hockey!). Get ready for the same, the savior has arrived, media push. Pushing Tocchet’s openness and accessibility just as hard as they promoted Torts combativeness and disregard for modern hockey with the same level of realistic analysis, none. Remember how much we were told the players loved Torts and to not look behind the curtain. Tocchet’s going to be promoted as the Dali Lama.
They have a product to sell, it’s entertainment to make money, hockey is what happens during the commercials.
Hahahaha! I’m not discounting Buium. He may prove to be a great fit in MIN but you’re trashing the team over them selecting Luchanko over Buium when neither has proved anything in the pros . .. oh wait, Luchanko was pretty good in the playoffs for LHV. They were both drafted high enough, they should both have a 90% chance of being NHL regulars. We already have the Buium type Dman here and I would rather have a center than a duplicate of that. This is not complicated.
I am not discounting Luchanko as a player, just as the BPA when the Flyers drafted. Buium was a consensus steal at a position of critical need, outside of the Flyers war room. They even traded out of their spot to avoid taking him. This has the making of when the Eagles selected Reagor over Justin Jefferson because Raegor was a better fit despite JJ being the consensus better talent. Roseman publicly admitted that after that embarrassing screwup he switched from drafting for fit to BPA and it’s worked out pretty well for him. God forbid the Flyers learn anything from the Eagles.
Jett playing in a few AHL playoff games has no bearing on his NHL potential or career. Hopefully he has improved from the shitshow he was when they tried to force him onto the roster last year. The Flyers need him to pan out but even if he does. When does the actual rebuild start? Still no #1 Center, #1 D, #1 goalie. Rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic.
Size matters but exceptional players are exceptions. Is Bobby Brink an exceptional player? I don’t think he is. The center situation is a little better this year and a man deeper with Luchanko if he can pull it off. If not, they might have to scramble at 4C if there’s a long injury or Tocchet just wants to work both Cates and Dvorak into the top 9. If Zegras gets back to a .7 or so PPG level, he’s your number one center. I think he can do a little better. The D still needs work. There are only so many guys in the league that are better than Sanheim. It’s not that long a list.
I highly doubt Brink is going to be an exceptional player. He’s also 5’8″. Buium (6′, 185), who you discount based on size/weight is not small by any measure. He is the same size/weight as other cup winning defensemen such as Makar and appears to have the traits and resume of an exceptional future player, Jett does not. Jett, who is smaller (5’11”) and lighter (180) has the resume a “born to be a flyer” player. Oh no, he fails every metric you declared for being hard to play against and yet you ignore it.
The coach-player relationship between Tippett and the fickle, irascible Tortorella took a downturn over the course of Tortorella’s final calendar year behind the Philadelphia bench. This was true of many Flyers players, not just Tippett. Few players were sorry to see “Torts” go.
Many media members defended Torts player interactions/relationships. York says hi. Over the years there were many discussions on whether players would or did avoid Philly because of Torts and we were assured that it was all overblown, the Players loved Torts. Torts was great! Since Torts declared he didn’t want to be responsible anymore for a poopy roster which he was main force in shaping, the media is like a jilted girl’s best friend telling her all the things she kept quiet about her ex so as not to offend her friend.
Torts was a disaster as a coach/triumvirate GM but he had Comcast shielding him before.
Entering the 2024-25 season, there were high hopes that Tippett could attain his first 30-plus goal season in the National Hockey League. He had job security, starting a new eight-year contract ($6.2 million average annual value). He turned 26 on February 16, and seemed primed for a career-best season.
Tortorella was sometimes to blame for this himself by sending mixed messages: “safe is death” and “I want my offensive players to be aggressive up the ice” until they made an ill-timed turnover or a bad puck support read that ended up in the Philadelphia net.
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Mike Keenan needed the late EJ McGuire to “clean the blood off the walls” (McGuire’s own description), and Tortorella had Shaw do it. Tocchet will say what he feels he needs to be said to a player. However, he won’t do it in front of teammates and he won’t tell the media that today’s players are “young and dumb”.Tip is a one trick pony who needs the perfect situation to do well. He is a limited hockey player and may have already reached his ceiling, if so that contract was premature. Maybe DB should stop handing out 8 year contracts to limited players on a team that is years from contention. Not saying they shouldn’t have resigned Tip but much like Fletch, gave the player Term, Money, and clause.
Also as mentioned, Torts coaching was such a blessing. How can the Flyers hope to improve on that after the media ate it all up for 3 years? It must feel like you are finally free.
In your opinion are the Flyers hard to play against? Torts thought he built a hard to play against team. What is your definition for that cliche?
the real problem starts at the top with ownership. then trickles down layer by layer.
The almost nine year long Hextall/Fletcher catastrophe is over. That destroyed this team, no question. This is now. The team still has issues but it’s a ton better off than it was.
as I said the real problem starts at the top. the same top that is still in place when those 2 were the GM. that hasn’t changed. replaced scott with another dope who has no business running a sports team.
briere part of fletcher’s staff, no? the amount of felating that briere receives is pure entertainment.
a ton better. god I love flyers fans. most delusional uneducated fan out there.
Torts was the face of the rebuild across both Fletcher and Briere’s tenure until his act wore out, started a fight with York, and told the world the Flyers are fcked. Yet DB still wanted to run it back.
Yea it’s crazy how no matter what crazy thing Torts did, it was excused, old time hockey baby!. Hell now according to some fans the Flyers aren’t even tough to play against despite that being Torts motto for 3 years. These fans would never dare post that when Torts was here though.
It’s going to be the same with DB. In a couple of years.
Well, we don’t know what the next 4 years will bring for Tippett. The Hartnell comp is reasonable, because he did get great contracts here and his production did slack in spots. He took some heat for that too. He also had 2 30 goal and 5 20 goal seasons, was good in the 08 playoffs and great in 2010. You know, back in the days the Flyers usually made the playoffs and won rounds. Tippett is one of the least of my Flyers concerns.
Holmgren was the GM for the first few years of the salary cap era. He absolutely did not understand the salary cap and only retired after he traded away every asset and hamstrung the Flyers financially for the next 5 years but yea, they did win a few rounds pretending the salary cap didn’t exist. He was the college kid throwing a party at his parents house but all everyone remembers is the party and not the mess left behind.
https://hockeconomics.substack.com/p/philadelphia-flyers-20-worst-contracts
Edit : damn, they list the Briere contract as one of the worst in Flyers history. Go Holmgren!
McDavid isn’t a defenseman either. It was awesome how all those 170 pound FLA Dmen were able to contain McD though. It’ll be interesting to see how Buium fits in Minnesota. The Flyers already had Drysdale for that role, I know that was a bad return in a bad spot, and needed a center more. The draft is done. Luchanko might still make the team this year. The Flyers can still use another guy who can play center.
Never said he was. Your arguments are a bit all over the place. So do you not care about size of forwards now? Is it the size on defense that contained McDavid or was it the defense backchecking like demons? Backchecking is not dependent on being huge. The puck is at ice level for everyone. Does skill matter at all in your world or is everyone Nick Seeler in a 6′ 200lb frame? It seems your position seems to change depending on the post.
Luchanko will definately make the team this year. Ready or not. Look how bad he was last year and they still tried to force him onto the roster. If he didn’t poop the bed so bad he might’ve gotten his 10 games in at least. It’s not like he had a stellar training camp either.
The Flyers could use a franchise center, franchise dman, and franchise goalie. You still haven’t addressed how the Flyers are going to acquire those necessary pieces.
Imagine Sanheim only having to be your #2 or #3 dman. Imagine Coots as your #2 center and Luchanko as your #3 center. Imagine, because that’s the only place you see the Flyers as a good team.
6.25 mill/yr for the next 8 years and 4 years of NTC is definitely a problem if his ceiling is a 20 goal scorer. The problem isn’t the player, it’s the contract.
If Tippett can put up roughly the same type of numbers Hartnell did when he was here, that contract will be OK. Three seasons in, Tippett is a little ahead of Hartnell’s pace. Tippett will score closer to 30 than 20 this year.
I take it you aren’t discounting arguments by saying they are “hypothetical” any more because that’s just wishful thinking.
Also, Hartnell averaged 22 goals over his 7 year flyers career and was signed under yet another Flyers special contract which was considered particularly bad and was moved just 1 year into it’s 6 year term and subsequently had the last 2 years bought out. He had 2 good years out of 7, people forget the other 5.
So if you want to say he’s the next Hartnell, you might not be far off. Tippett’s already had 1 of 2 good years out of 7.
The Flyers are just going to outwork everyone to the Stanley Cup, talent be damned.
Yes, that’s the answer. Make the Ice Capades fans happy with lots of “puck moving” defensemen and highly skilled, speedy forwards who weigh less than most of the players on the US Women’s National Team. That’s a sure formula for a Cup win.
How about instead working off of a false premise that talent and hard work are mutually exclusive we agree that it takes talent and hard work to win the Stanley Cup?
Connor McDavid may be 6’1″ but he weighs 194, only a few more lbs than Buium and far less than your 200 lb minimum criteria to be on a cup team. Are those 6 lbs why the oilers didn’t win the cup last year? If he was only 5’11 do you not draft him because he’s not 6′ despite his amazing talent?
If you want amazing talent in a 6′ + frame, there’s only one place to get it, the top of the draft, where the Flyers refuse to go.
Barkov never hit UFA. Ekblad never hit UFA, Crosby never hit UFA, McKinnon never hit UFA, and so on and so on. Even Tkatchuk, had to both refuse to sign with the team and another top 5 pick player willing to go to Calgary for the types of players the Flyers do not have. Where do you think the Flyers are going to get these types of Stanley Cup players?
Despite your complaints that the Flyers just need to work harder, that’s exactly what the Flyers have been focusing on the last 3 years. The result :
https://www.nhl.com/news/philadelphia-flyers-relieve-john-tortorella-of-his-duties-as-head-coach
in bold is so comical. yep, not a big talent discrepancy at all.
yeah, maybe I will watch. then I can possibly learn. my guess it will tell me the same thing. flyers are 2000 lightyears away from any point of contention.
that is a truckload of players to move out. flyers can really set themselves up for the future by moving those 2. they have zero interest in moving RR. I hope they re-sign him. shit hope they re-sgin dvorak as well.
The Flyers are just going to outwork everyone to the Stanley Cup, talent be damned. That’s the message Torts and the Flyers have been peddling the last 3 years. It’s crazy how the Flyers and their fans are the only people who know this secret. That’s why they’ve been so successful. Just don’t let the rest of the league know.
::facepalm::
