BearOnIce

as mojo pointed out, the dcorps for the flyers right now are all high end skaters. their defensive instincts might be open to critisism, but each one, especially kimmo, carle and coburn, are fast and agile guys. given that the rest of your synopsis is based on the premise that they can't skate......

they are not a heavy hitting bunch. they are not a nasty clear the crease bunch. they are not a heavy shooting bunch. they are a fast bunch.

as has been said by myself and others but largely ignored, the big issue right now is the lack of d-zone participation from the forwards. the 6 defensemen are getting scape goated, because that's what happens here, but they are not the issue. not the major one, anyway.

here. the 2 even strength goals from yesterday:

goal #4. anisimov has managed to get goal side on rinaldo, and as the pass in progress comes across, he manages another couple feet of seperation and taps the puck in backdoor, essentially uncontested. yes, gustafsson's flubbed pass created the situation, but the goal itself was preventable had the forwards picked up their checks. note how much space and time couturier has given stephan to make the cross ice pass. gustafsson's position isn't perfect, but given the puck was on gaborik's stick below the goalline a moment prior, it isn't completely inappropriate.

goal #5. the rangers have just been cycling behind the net, and giroux has been chasing the puck, switching his check from puck carrier to puck carrier to puck carrier, forcing the dmen to adjust and readjust their coverage based on him and not the play. seconds before the shot above, giroux had dropped his coverage of hagelin at the back door to chase richards on the other side of the ice. once he left hagelin, richards fed a pass across to hagelin, who's one-time missed wide and bounced off the back boards, coming back out to callahan, who knocked it in. in the photo above, giroux is peeling off his b-line to richards on the near side after the pass across. callahan should be carle's man; but giroux had been in that exact spot not a second before. coverages were confused and the flyers d+c had piled up in the crease. the entire time, jagr and hartnell stood there watching. mind you, the puck had been below the dots for 9+ seconds prior to the goal being scored, 9+ seconds of rangers posession low, with obvious and worsening coverage problems...but the wingers felt it inappropriate to get involved in any way or do anything other than yell encouraging words.

the flyer's d far from perfect, but as i've said before, to lay the blame on those 6 guys gives a pass to 12 forwards and a system that are not getting the job done right now. an allstar defensive squad will quickly find itself overwhelmed if it is not supported by the other 3 skaters on the ice, and i do not disagree that this is not an allstar defensive squad.

edit: though after seeing the first goal tonight, the flyers really need to find a way to make the front of their net a less plesant place for opposing forwards to camp out. that definitely needs some work.

Nice analysis.

My premise should have been, well ok, they can skate but they cannot D.

Keep the faith.

ouch

Open mouth. Insert foot. Bite hard.

Move Colburn, and the others.

Flyers played a good game, but are undisciplined and have not made a move to replace Pronger. His 28-30 minutes a nite would fix most of your goalie problems....Bob looked confused several times tonight. Datsyuk was huge as usual, Kronwall is the most underrated player in hockey, 2nd in the nhl in defensemen goals and the best open ice hitter in the game. Schenn was amazing tonight, he had his first goal in the outdoor game he is up to eight now. Richards for Schenn and Simmonds. Wonder if the Kings would like to take that one back? Joey Mac gave up three goals, at least one was his fault, but the Wings team defense was on display tonight and their big three Z, Pavel and the Mule all scored.Great win!!

I cannot disagree with anything you say. My team is in the woodshed right now.

Congratulation to a fine team and a proud franchise on your 20th at home!

But isn't that what Homer does best? Band-aids. I can totally see Homer doing this and leaving the team in the lurch once again. In fact, I'll guarantee this is what happens. Over pay for an over-the-hill defenseman who won't add anything.

More credence to why I am getting closer to NHL Center Ice as my home team.

Hope he enjoyed watching the Bertuzzi goal.. He looked like an occasional tourist. He had a great view.. $4.2M? Nope

i like your optimism... i hope you're right. however, most signs point to a loss. they're terrible in back to back games and they're trending horribly in just about every category. combine that with a detroit team that has been finding a groove lately, well.. i think it could be ugly.

i do hope they rise to the occasion and prove you right and me wrong though.

9 W -11 L since Winter Classic. Flyers D creating problems. Detroit trying to make it 20 home wins in a row. Motivation there. Volatile mix. Flyers lose tonight, expect psyincter-level meter at WFC Monday morning to rachet up and be off the chart. If it is a slaughter, a trade will be eminent.

there's a lot of rumors floating around about the flyers and some seem more credible than others. namely, i heard that montreal canadiens GM Pierre Gauthier was seen at saturday's game between the flyers and rangers.

the most likely trade between us and them would be for Hal Gill. what do we think about this trade possibility? i'm not sure i'm a big fan of it, but i suppose it would be a question of what players it would take to trade. who could pierre have been looking at on sat? i sure hope it wasn't bob.

I think Hal Gill would be a band-aid. I can't see Holmgren going for it.

It's an unsustainable system. You can't play a go-go hockey and expect to win every night. Like you mentioned, this system stresses the entire team, so no wonder they didn't come out hard in the 3rd period. How can you have anything left in the tank when you constantly in the attack zone and abandon the defense?

I really begin to question this coach's ability, to be honest. I don't know how much of his previous success had to do with his coaching or just having a stellar goaltending, and when he doesn't have that goaltending at his disposal, he is hapless. He sort of reminds me John Stevens: same tactics, same strategy form game to game with no adjustements based on the opposition. Laviolette may be a decent motivator, but I don't know how good of an x's and o's he is.

Good points MD. You really know hockey, unlike some of the thugs on this forum. Bear appreciates your hockey intelligence.

I do not question Lavy. I question his flexibility right now with what he has to work with.

A stand-on-your-head top notch goalie is the difference to Lavy's system working, or not. I bet he put a lot of pressure on Holmgren and Snider in the off-season to get a top goalie, like Bryz. So, that being said, that is why Lavy is still trying to go with the guy and let Bryz try to work it out. What option does he have? The G is that important to his system. But Bryz has never had to work this unexposed before, at least not in Phoenix...

I think the real problem, net-net, is the D. They just aren't that good. You can squarely fault the Flyers lack of a farm system. CP20 out exposed them even further. Add a basically weak D, that is not that known for skating. Then that is forced to skate up and back with the forwards, that are pretty fast let me add. Then approaching the second half of the season when the fatigue and injuies are starting to show. And then the D can't get back in position to man-up, keep the crease clean, and win the puck battles in the corners, after skating up and back with the forwards, and you see what we have now. I do not think it is conditioning. Look no further than Kimmo as an example. It's the system!

Watch tonight and see what I am saying when the D gets totally out of position.

Lavy has to modify the system short term and Holmgren has got to make a trade. It really is that simple and when that is done there will be a huge improvement.

One more thing, when the forwards just start flying around and the D joins, although the backside is exposed completely, you do see the system work. So unless Bryz becomes a Cam Ward and stops every breakdown, the system has to change.

I have a feeling that after tonights game you'll be able to "really get going".

.-( They'd better win or the xhit is going to hit the fan tomorrow morning at WFC Flyer-Land....

The dregs....

Sunday night! 7 EST. Flyers-Red Wings at the Joe!

Detroit tries to tie the record for the longest home winning streak ever...held by their opponent, the Philadelphia Flyers! How appropriate that they should be the team to try to stop the Wings. Saw this game coming about 5 home games ago, and thought it would be fantastic to attempt it against the record-holders.

If Joey Mac plays like he did tonight, I'm feeling pretty good about Detroit getting #20. He played outstanding tonight. Gotta be good for him going into Sunday's game.

Detroit was fortunate to get #19 tonight. They have really benefitted from the shootout wins this season. They're what? 7-1 now in SO? It's sure ain't bad having Pavel Datsyuk starting all our shootouts, though. Wonder if that's got anything to do with it, eh? ;-P

Should be a fun game to watch. Is Bryzgalov gonna be in net? I think I know who's going for Detroit.

Flyers will rule you tonite. They are a f'king pissed off team after getting the xhit kicked out of them by the rags.

Maybe the lack of on ice leadership is causing them not to play the system Lavi wants them to play, consistantly that is. The thing I don't understand is there shouldn't be a lack of leadership. Timmo, Briere, Talbot, G, (Shelly, ok maybe not on the ice but atleast locker room).

Hope things are well in Idaahoo today. Beautiful part f the world.

There is no leader and there is no leadership. Kimmo trys to speak out but the leadership role does not come naturally to him. Hartnell is a clown. Briere is a nice, laid-back little French-Canadien boy. Talbot is one year in and just a nice addition. Jarg is a gun for hire. Shelley never plays. Lots of new guys all real young. G is the future leadership, Comcast seems gun shy. CP20 was supposed to be The Guy. Remind you of last year a bit? Lots of great guys and different types but no player leader. This is the biggest loss of CP20.

Are you saying I'm going all homer (fan of home team, not Flyers GM) on this forum? I posted in support of Lavy, and instead suggested that the guy who I think is the D coach is garbage. I will stick to that statement, and don't think it is a homer thing to say at all.

I would agree with you. I like all of Howie's points though.

Prior to injury, Pronger had 12 points in 13 games skating 22:29 ATOI.

So while not, I don't know, 1999-2000 nasty, he still remained a superstar nonetheless

I love Pronger, don't get me wrong, been following Nastly Chris since The Note at Keil, but I would rather see him on the bench with Lavi, and trying to live the rest of his life with some semblance of health and normalcy. Add Primeau... Now that boys would be a coaching staff... Just give Prim's and CP20 a pair of sunglasses that wrap around the side of their heads like those 80 year old people you see driving all the time on I-95 and they would be cooking..

^^ Nomination for post of the year. The only people who can argue with that are Snider and Holmgren.

Thank you very much. Wait until I really get going.

BOI: I think Detroit and Nashville might teach us something about player development. I am not sure if things change a lot until Snider's passing.

Best,

Howie

May he rest in piece. We will set the next Stanley Cup on his grave and sing Kum Ba Ya.

No , the Cult is/was a rock band from the 80s... They played rock at punk rock tempo, wrote my favorite pop rock song "she sells sanctuary" as well as fire woman, rain and love removal machine. Sonic Temple was probably their creative zenith in 1988 it was a glorious studio rock album. I always loved this image of Billy Duffy, that's what a rock guitar plater should look like.

They are/ were not derivative of BOC in any way.

Go ya.

Reflecting back on the last 7 years or so

Hitch would have won the cup with the 03-04 Flyers with one more defenseman or one less commissioner screwing the Flyers ( and ultimately the Flames) so that a southern team could win the cup

Hitch lost a year and then was faced with a new set of rules and many new players and some young ones who tuned him out and got him fired.

In walks John Stevens who cant coach his way out of a wet paper bag and coddles the players and has no system. They sorta rise from the ashes on talent alone and being young whatever, a few veteran presences (Jason Smith and Knuble) and a sorta goalie in Biron.

Finally the young ones screw Stevens and his lack of system or a system so totally not at the NHL level and Lavi comes in and they have a miracle year with Emery sidelined & Leighton and Boucher in the nets but fall a few goals short in the finals, again one of the young guns choking with an empty net high

Lavi won the first cup post lockout in a world of new rules that to be brutally frank, are totally different from year to year, when coming near a player would be a penalty, we all know what 05-06 and 06-07 were like in the early fix it for Crosby era. Lavi was the beneficiary of a a lot of things in 05-06

In my mind now looking at how well the St Louis Blues are doing with Hitch with a bit less talent (& a good goalie in Halak)than their record indicates, he was the best of the recent bunch of coaches & maybe that 03-04 team was a lot better than we ever thought and Esche was a better goalie than anything thats been here since. He was the team USA goalie for many years in international play over that period and kept the teams in the game. He was not that bad for us post lockout, more internal coach vs goalie thing.

I think Hitch was and is a better coach than Lavi , better systems guy, better prepraration etc.

Carter & Richards are coach killers, and Richards may be the better all around player but I still hate him, for his lousy play right before Hitch was fired. All he would do is come down the wing and take a slapshot right into the goalies glove/pad.

Yea, I like Kapt'n Kangaroo too.. Good points... You seem like you know a bit about hockey.. So what would you do Coach Bob with this 2011-12 Flyers team?

Reese took the Flyers within two wins of the Stanley Cup with Brian "Uh oh" Boucher and Michael "Leaky" ******* Leighton. He's not the problem. Move along.

Berube has shown success coaching the PP/PK over his tenure, and Lavy seems to lean on Berube significantly. I know he wasn't a stud player, but nor was Bylsma. Maybe Berube has more to offer than he is given credit here (a damn near certainty...sheesh).

Lavy is a proven winner, and the offense shows up. He is also a constructive criticism coach (remember 24/7, and the contrast between he and Torts). He manages games well aside from goalies, as evidenced by his knack for timely timeouts, overall solid roster decisions/scratches, and line combinations/adjustments/lack of adjustments in the name of continuity.

I am very under-impressed with McCarthy. Can the Flyers promote Hatcher or involve Pronger (not at games due to light and noise) here?

Lavy is a solid NHL coach. And he has a Cup with a very average Carolina team with a very average goalie. I also grew up with the kid in my home town so I am here to tell you Doom he was a good player with a good head on his shoulders. McCarthy can go tomorrow and I will be happy. No more homerism. Go outside.

Hartnell should be benched? He's our leading scorer and has been pretty responsible considering previous years, plus his attitude seems to be great. No need to ruin that.

Hatrnell? I could score 20 goals if i was on that line. He will be the overated Leino of the 2011-12 season.

No. He is not. It's as dumb as hiring an offensive line coach as your defensive coordinator. It's just plain stupid.

As for the team, I think we're seeing from the team quite a bit better than what should have realistically been expected coming into the season. Unfortunately, some of our weaknesses were supposed to be covered by a #1 goalie and a #1 defenseman. One forgot how to play and the other is hurt.

The Chief is a Comcast-Flyers mole. I have said from the beginning this franchise cannot be serious with him there as an assistant.

Greetings:

This loss was disturbing on a number of fronts. FYI, we are now 6-7-2 in our division. That is hard to imagine and a good indicator of where we might fall in terms of playoff potential--if we can't cut the mustard in the division I don't see much good ahead later on.

1) Bobo: Athleticism can't make up for lack of positioning. Yes, he was hung out to dry by the D but he also seemed unaware of surroundings and overall play.

2) The D: Carchidi's assessment is on point. Their lack of body-clearing and AWOL at the front says the problem is deeper than Pronger's absence.

3) Meznaros and Hartnell Should Be Benched: Seriously--stupid, stupid penalties.

4) An Occasional Fight is OK: But, it isn't a substitute for skilled, intelligent play. Detroit is tough, but they don't need fights to prove it.

5) Lavi's Style: I'll agree with others that it might be a mismatch given the status of the D and Goaltending. But let's face it, this roster reflects Homer and his staff. And right now, I am beginning to think that Simmonds and our forward pickups barely outweigh a D and goaltending that look iffy.

6) Lavi Should have Put Bacashua (sp) in the Game at 4 or 5-2: As I understand it, this guy is our likely backup if either Bobo or Bryz goes down in the next 30 games--Leighton faces re-entry waivers. I would have given the guy some time to face NHL play. I'll go a step further. I might start the guy to kick Bobo/Bryz in the ass and to light a fire under the others.

They have an interesting test in Detroit later today. It may be one of the pivotal games of the season, if not the last few years.

Best,

Howie

If they get blown out by Detroit, a likely scenerio, then the Snider Holmgren Comcast spin will start in earnst. If Laviolette is the fall guy I will divorce this team forever and move to NHL Center Ice. When you don't have a farm system that deveops players like the Red Wings do, and have done consistently with excellence, you get the slop that we have consistently seen the past 20+ years with this Flyers franchise. Excuse after excuse year after year. It makes it hard for a local hockey fan to get on board with this franchisee's as their local NHL team. I am so tired of hearing Snider say he does everything to win, then does not do everything to win because of the stupid personnel decisions of this franchise. Ok, let's see what this genius Holmgren does. The Pronger situation masks the real situation. Dump and chase does not work in the NHL today with the size and skill set of our forwards. We do not have an Alpha Male beast center on the whole team. There needs to be a better defensive puck control system with better backchecking and defensive scheme. The D is truly porous and lightweight, no grit or meanness. No blue line fear. Thrown around like rag dolls. By the NY Rag Dolls. Start moving pieces now like Carle, Colburn, Lilja, Gus. Get a mean SOB crease clearing D Beast for the Pronger money. Even if Pronger comes back, you get a washed up 37 year old with a bad pumpikin head and a financial lead anchor. Pronger was arguably the second greatest D man after Off, very diffent styles, but The Alpha make D Beast. But, time to move on. Tell him to retre and Comcast take the insurance money. Goalie? This is on Holmgren. This was his defining off season moment. Maybe with a D in front of him Bryz would look better. Let's see if the Flyer Homerism gets a back seat to Comcast greed here. Got to sell the seats and merchandise. Flyers Hockey is Big Business.

I think you mean it in good fun, but I think calling his parenting out is way out of line.

Nothing is out of line with me. His wife needs to get her Xhit together. Kid looks like a future axe murderer to me. Explains a lot about the absentee father

He is being treated for severe sunburn after prolonged exposure to the Red Light that has gone off behind him excessively this season!

He has food poisoning from eating that dog of his you saw in 24/7. Love his kids. A lot of supervision there.

The flyers have been really inconsistent this year, but one area where they are consistent is the last part of the season...they stink.

Last year, 3 - 8 to limp into the playoffs, where Ritchie and company said that we will turn it on...and didn't.

The year before, 4 - 8 to slide into the playoffs with the rare shoot out win against the Rangers. Nice run, but probably gave us some false hope.

This team has way too many rookies to make any kind of run. Rooks hit the wall toward the end of the season, due to a number of reasons, one being they never play more than 40 or 50 games in a season. Good Defense will stifle our top lines, which they have already started to do, and we will be on the outside looking in this year.

I hope I am wrong, and that our experienced guys will prevail, but it doesn't bode well for us to be this fragmented...with inconsistent play and bad goaltending.

Bummer.

Like your dog. Flyers are not going anywhere this year. Bear says you can take it to the bank.