On 3/24/2019 at 10:00 PM, OccamsRazor said:

I think the pick is traded in a package for a player who can help now....

The team has so many needs though. I'm not sure what they could get for a mid pick. It would have to involve a roster player to bring someone useful back I think. 

2 minutes ago, Hartsheart said:

Another question I have is why do the Flyers always seem to have to go with the 3 headed Goalie system? To me that is nothing more than a big headache.

I think you mean eight headed goalie system.

5 minutes ago, Hartsheart said:

what was the point in acquiring Talbot in the first place then? 

That my friend is the million dollar question many of us would love to have answered. Clearly it's not to have him play actual games, cause he hasn't been doing that.

I'd say the most likely scenario is that Talbot has been crapping the bed in practice, and the brass has never felt comfortable playing him. Aside from that, it might have been some sort of "favour" to Stolarz moving him to a market where he could become a starter while he's still in his prime. 

If in fact Elliott has been placed in net for Talbot because the former is proving to be a better goalie, that doesn't bode very well for Talbot at all. It's not like Elliott is lighting the world on fire. The bar is pretty low.

But for some reason, he's not getting ice time while Elliott has. That tells me something's clearly gone awry in the Talbot camp.

11 hours ago, Hartsheart said:

What they need to do is re-assign paper mache Elliott out of here and let Cam Talbot be the back up and give him some starts. 

I honestly don't see the point of Talbot at all. There's likely a very good reason he hasn't had any ice time, and it's not because Elliott been stellar. It was a bad acquisition from the start imo, and I really hope Fletch doesn't tie up some 4-5mil in a guy like that. At least Elliott has a decent price tag. Talbot is no better than Elliott at twice the cost.

29 minutes ago, brelic said:

 

Might help soften the blow from losing a defenseman in the expansion draft.

 

 

We can fault Hexy for a number of things, but his staff's ability to find and draft talented players was truly remarkable. We obviously don't know how they'll all pan out, but it does appear like an embarrassment of riches in lower leagues if nothing else. Let's hope whatever scouting staff was involved in all that is kept and allowed to continue their work.

1 hour ago, brelic said:

 

Does it involve a wood chipper?

Wait -- are we going to Minnesota for a game?

36 minutes ago, brelic said:

But he plays LW and so does JVR... we're left-heavy.

 

I agree. I also have a solution for JVR if you'd like to hear it. 

6 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

 

Ever since they got him a centre who can get him the puck he's been lighting it up.

Much like Frost, it def feels like this guy has nothing more to prove in juniors. It'll be interesting to see if his level of play can carry over to playing vs men the AHL.

37 minutes ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

A lot of that will depend on who his linemates are.

 

Surely it won't be Simmonds on the 3rd next year.

 

Maybe NAK.

I can't imagine Simmonds is long for this team. That would be crazy, right?

As far as NAK goes though, that would just be adding a second rookie to the line. Again, I'm not saying it's a bad move, but it's definitely adding even more relative unknowns.

At this point though, what the hell do we have to lose?

1 hour ago, BobbyClarkeFan16 said:

 

I expect a career pattern similar to Mike Richards to start. I think he'll be a 30 to 35 point guy his first year, maybe a sight bump the second season and then explodes in his third year. 

That would be nice. 30-35 pts as a rookie is actually very good. It would put him on par with Patrick in his rookie season.

More than likely Frost would be playing as the 3C though. That's a tough gig to get 30-35 in a rookie season. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I would def be very impressed if he did that. We all should.

If he followed the trajectory you've noted, that would essentially equate him to many top 10 picks, which would make him a definite steal. I hope you're right.

Frost clearly has nothing left to prove in juniors. It'll be interesting to see how well he makes the jump to playing vs men.

2 minutes ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

See the catch here I think is about exposing 10% of your salary so Jake may be needed for that Jake and JVR together would make up what 15mill+ on a 75 mill cap. The will need another good contract to make that work.

 

So unfortunately Jake needs to stay to make it work.

 

Unless you have another bloated contract to throw in there.

I didn't know there was such a rule. How does it work exactly?

I really hope Fletch gets some good trades in rather than lose talent away for nothing. Somehow I doubt he'll make the truly impactful ones we probably need though. 

Some options for them (the save eight route):

Giroux

Couturier

TK

Patrick

Provorov

Sanheim

Ghost

Myers

Hart

Hopefully Fletch would have the good sense to trade away Voracek before Seattle plucks him. I do think we could get a very nice return for him in a trade. Assuming he would, JVR would seem the most likely candidate to go, which I'm fine with. If somehow Fletch can trade both of those guys, I figure we'd probably lose Lindblom or Gudas. Losing Lindblom would suck, but there's only so much we can do.

The seven and three split (imo the most likely scenario barring a trade right now):

Giroux

Couturier

TK

Patrick

Voracek

Lindblom

JVR

Provorov

Sanheim

Ghost

Hart

If Myers shows some serious promise in the next bit, I would probably dangle Ghost in a trade and keep Myers instead. I think Sanheim will be better, and I'd rather see what Myers can become before we lose him. If the above list is saved, I can see Seattle taking a flier on Myers. If they need depth, Laughton could be their pick here as well. This list is pretty much what I expect will be kept honestly. My guess is Myers or Laughton will be lost to the draft.

It would also be possible to dangle either Voracek or JVR and keep Laughton, but I don't know that Fletch will go for that. Laughton is a solid depth player, but he's nothing more than that. As much as Voracek and JVR are not my favs, we don't currently have other players to replace them in the top six (aside from a bunch of essentially unproven prospects from much weaker leagues). If he goes this route, I'd much rather he trade whichever of the two he's not going to protect. Again, get something for em at least.

When did this Bailey kid show up anyway? I feel like I hadn't heard anything about him until just very recently.

10 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

It is why i but ok just riding this year out and showing the whole coaching staff the door and going from there...

 

..i want to move guys like Lehtera, Weal and Folin and seeing where the cards may fall....the chances of them doing more harm than good makes me prefer to do nothing.

@RonJeremy's right though. No one's going to want those guys. When you're bad on one of the worse teams in the league, people don't generally come knocking for your services.

12 minutes ago, vis said:

http://www2.philly.com/flyers/chuck-fletcher-philadelphia-flyers-general-manager-gm-hired-source-20181203.html

 

Should get interesting quick...

 

 

Every general manager has his own take “on how it should be run,” the Flyers executive said. “For me, and I think Chuck has done the same, I think it’s how you treat your people, so everybody is included as to what’s going on. The people who work for you have to know you trust them and want their opinions and care about them -- and it will be returned every time. Chuck will have that.”

“He’ll do a great job in Philly,” the Flyers executive said. “Everybody’s going to be happy to work for him. Everybody’s going to be happy he’s there. His reputation, which is pretty easy when you talk to scouts and all those who have worked for him, is top-level. Everybody enjoyed working for him. Everybody wanted to work for him. Everybody felt part of the team.”

How different is this from the recent Hexy micromanagement stuff? Homer must have ate this stuff up.

Also of note:

Fletcher’s family has ties to the recently fired Joel Quenneville, who coached Chicago to three Stanley Cups and is a candidate to replace Dave Hakstol if the new GM changes his coach.

2 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

Sydney hockey player gets invitation to Philadelphia Flyers rookie camp

 

http://www.capebretonpost.com/sports/sydney-hockey-player-gets-invitation-to-philadelphia-flyers-rookie-camp-221784/

 

 

 

I wonder if Couts is behind this somehow.

17 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

Today in Flyers history...

 

 

...man i miss BIG E days!!!!

Watching old clips like that, it's amazing to me how much slower the game used to be. It's like everyone's skating in slow motion.

4 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

Or that even though Ivan was a rookie and hands down was the best defenseman on the team...he still finished -7!!!

 

Imagine how different that would be if he didn't have a boat anchor for a defensive partner most of the season? Maybe that can change this year...

I don't think Giroux should be off-limits, but I definitely think the price to get him should be quite high. He's the only real homegrown success story we've had in the last ten years (Provo will change that), and I do think that means something. Sure, he's getting paid too much, but as folks have already pointed out, he's not the only one. There are plenty of players in and around his production getting paid in his range. It's the way the NHL market works. Your best players get the best cut of the budget.

At the moment, he's sitting on about 11% of the team's cap hit. For comparables, that's around the same range as: Getzlaf, Zetterberg, and the Sedins. All of those players were the best on their teams when the contracts were signed (Datsyuk was in the same range before he left), and so they got about 10-11% of the cap.

If we had better players when G's contract was up, he would have gotten a bit less. We didn't, and still don't, so he gets that cut. I'm not saying it's a great deal today, but I can absolutely understand why it was struck at the time. Giroux was that guy, so he got paid like that guy.

That's not to say he should be untouchable. But until we get some sort of better producer to take his place and effectively anchor this team, trading him should be a question of getting a very high return. Trading him in any other context would just mean sinking further down the standings for very little gain.

That said... tanking does seem to be the only way to relevance in today's NHL, so maybe it makes more sense than I realize...

3 hours ago, sekkes85 said:

Well lucky #7!  I'd like to get Michael Rasmussen to add some more size to the lineup and give us another power forward.  If they stand at 13 I'm hoping Eeli Tolvanen.  Not a big body but has more of a shoot first mentality that this team is lacking horribly.

I was reading an article in THN the other day that looked at the last 10 years of cup winners. It compared the teams based on a number of interesting metrics including average player size. In the end, the article largely confirmed what many of us can figure out by simple eye test, which is that the recent bout of cup winners are generally not very big teams at all.

In fact, in the last ten years, the only cup winner with above average NHL player size was the Kings. All the other teams had players that were generally smaller than the NHL average. More than that even, in the case of Chicago, the average player size was and is well below NHL average.

All of this is pretty much in line with the new NHL reality: Bruising hockey is out. Speed and skill are in. That isn't to say we don't want large players. It just means smart teams are not making size the no.1 priority anymore.

I actually think Johansen for Jones is a pretty fair trade. I think Nashville wins out, but not because of the players. They have a deep d-core and simply didn't need Jones. They did need a top line center though, and now they have one.

That said, Jones will be a top dman in this league. In fact, his move from the d-rich Preds to the complete opposite in Columbus could very easily accelerate his development. He'll be getting big minutes there and will be counted on for PPs and pretty much everything else. Modern teams build from the back end up. In this regard, Jones is a fantastic piece of the puzzle to have.

The challenge for Columbus now will simply be a lack of top forwards. To be fair though, they were already missing that anyway.

I'm not sure how they could have gotten more at the deadline. Jones is a pretty great return.

2 hours ago, brelic said:

It's hard to compare the players directly because they are so different, but here's what they look like so far:

Coburn

• 30 years old (31 this month)
• $4.5M cap hit
• 16:19 ATOI
• 40GP, 6pts
• 0 +/-
• 47 shots, 65 hits, and 44 blocks
• 7 takeaways, 8 giveaways

Gudas

• 25 years old
• $990K cap hit
• 20:48 ATOI
• 33 GP, 2pts.
• 0 +/-
• 58 shots, 178 hits, 61 blocks
• 3 takeaways, 24 giveaways

And we got a 1st (Konecny) and 3rd (Tomek) out of it too???

Genius.

I agree absolutely. Coburn was overrated at best and a liability at worst. He was billed as a puck mover who is solid in his own end, but turned out to be barely the first and not at all the second. Gudas is billed as a tough guy who can punish in his own end while occasionally firing a shot or two from the point. He's lived up to that billing 100% in my mind. Give me the known quantity over the over-hyped any day.

1 hour ago, flyerrod said:

Coburn might be a better puck handler but he also had quite the penchant for scoring goals in his own net. Couple that with his inability to put a puck on net from more than 10 feet out, well lets just say that I don't miss Coburn very much. Gudas is a solid 3rd pair d-man with a reasonable salary and hits everything that moves along with the net when he shoots at it. I will take that trade 8 days a week and twice on Sundays.........

All true except for the bolded part. His tendency to fire shots that get blocked is verging on legendary.