radoran

The difference between "good" and "decent" teams is not insignificant and the gap between "good" (DAL/COL) and "bad" (CBJ/SJS) is vast. There's a 20 point difference from the top of the standings to the bubble. There's another 20 points (in the East) to the bottom of the standings - it's wider in the West. Teams with 14, 15, 16 more wins in the W column are significantly better. Again, not to say "bottom" teams "can't" beat "better" teams, it's whether they can do it 4 times each against "better" teams in the playoffs that matters. Chicago, Anaheim, and San Jose seem to be working on a method. So's Columbus, as if that counts for anything. But, hey, the Flyers have a 6.2% chance to make the playoffs. And they just beat the Rangers. Anything can happen.

Actively uninterested in PAYING to have a local team - and who can blame them?

Actual footage of the Pens, Isles, Wings, Caps, and Flyers on the bubble.

Yeah, wouldn't want to have professional athletes playing in substandard conditions. It would be a complete embarrassment to the league from which they might never recover.

Salt Lake Licks is sitting right there...

In related news, water still wet. Developing.

Stay on the search. You want to pick apart shifts and sift through the sands looking for a deeper answer - have at it. Report back. Let us know what you find.

Things aren't special because they happen to the Flyers. Occam's Razor - the theorem, not the poster - is a very useful tool (*ahem* ). The most likely answer is probably correct. The Flyers losing to the Cup Finalist Rangers 4-3 in the first round 10 years ago wasn't "a good sign." Them beating the Rangers 4-1 in Game 79 this year isn't "a good sign." Stop reading tea leaves and look at the broader picture. This team does not have the talent to win 16 playoff games. Beating Edmonton, the Rangers, and Colorado in the regular season doesn't mean they can hang with them in a seven game series. We know this because we've been watching this show for a decade. They do have the talent to beat anyone on any given night - based in no small part upon how that opponent plays. The Rangers had an off night. The Flyers put it all together. The Rangers are a top team that can recover from an off night. The Flyers - by your own evaluation - are a mystery that no one knows who's going to show up each night. That is a vast gap in hockey and the difference between a legit Cup contender and a middling bubble playoff team.

You previous point was not knowing whether or if they would play the same way again. That is ACBAOAGN. When, as @SCFlyguy has shown, you are typically getting 62% of your potential points, you are a league of difference away from 51%. It's the very difference between a team playing for the President's Cup and one hoping they beat Washington at the end of the season to possibly face them. The Rangers can afford a stinker in game 78. The Flyers need to be nearly flawless AND get mistakes from the other team. I'm looking for the Flyers to be on a reasonable trajectory to be in the former position than the latter. Getting back to where they were for the most futile decade of hockey in franchise history honestly, truly does not excite me a little bit. YMMV

You took a long ways to get back to what I said in the first place. All of the things are factors in all of the games. Rags lost to the Pens and Isles in the last 10 days. Late season division games against teams pushing for the playoffs while you're pushing for a team record in wins. Again, any given night. Back on the bubble.

After how many more Cups?

It's honestly that any given night a professional hockey team can beat another professional hockey team. It's doing it 16 times in four seven game series that's the trick...

Everything's great. Rebuild back on schedule - ahead even. Beat the Caps and make the playoffs. Good sign.

They will be the first franchise to not have the name of the city in their name. They will be THE DONNER PARTY Where LTIR goes to retire

Incompetence, indeed! Save $2.5M in Y1, costs $1.7M in Y2. It would not surprise me to see him on the roster next year...

Which is, well, at the very least, weird given that it was a "must win" game for the playoff push from the much ballyhooed "new culture" of the locker room. And they basically quit on each other and the coach. We've seen Flyer legends canned for such things. I really hope that they see this sign for what it is and not an "unfortunate problem that happened due to injuries and the eclipse".

To your point, I've got to imagine a lot of guys who gave a lot this year to get where they were aren't going to have the same depth of drive all of next season that they did this year. Much like a "Cup hangover" without the Cup. You can get guys "Miracle on Icing" which is great, but also one game. The Brooksian other side of that is "they might win nine". Talent wins Stanley Cups. It always has. It always will. Four seven playoff game rounds is a massive mountain to climb and arguably the most difficult tournament in professional sport. There is no way to shortcut this reality. You don't have to build "a good team" - you have to build a team that will beat four other teams' good team in four seven game playoff rounds. Anyone who thinks the Flyers are anywhere near this possibility should contact my realtor about this nice bridge on lower Manhattan that heads out to one of the boroughs... Beautiful views of the harbor.

Exactly the type of guys the Flyers would have run out of town on a rail after their ELC was up and traded for a washed up crap defenceman for six weeks. You're only delaying the inevitable. Again, me not disagreeing. Just saying all this extended drama about a 4th is dust in the larger windstorm. Losing the 4th is nothing compared to signing a roster player for four years.

He signed the contract while on IR. No, really. They signed a 30-year-old journeyman waiver wire pickup to a FOUR YEAR CONTRACT while he was ON INJURED RESERVE. He's played five games since then. The Flyers have lost all of them. But he's averaging around 19 minutes of ice time and he's blocked 16 shots! While the Flyers have given up 28 goals.

He didn't. Kaprizov signed after they canned Fletcher. Fletch didn't even sign him. I obviously don't disagree. I just think the wailing and gnashing of teeth from folks who also think the franchise's inability to develop players mirrors their inability to develop COVID without a mask sucking on a used ventilator tube in a NYC hospital in August 2020 is, shall we say, somewhat overblown? By all means, blow on. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

I mean, like your Pageaus, Copps, Nyqvists... Fantasy waiver wire types I know you hang you hat on Erik Gustaffssoonnn and Johnny Hockey. You should see how many years they don't have a 4th... https://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/teams/dr00007439.html

I don't think it's "the players" or "the coach" - I don't think he's a good enough coach to take a team with "good to great" talent to the next level. And the Flyers are no where near "good to great." He had two legit Hall of Fame scorers (VLC/MSL) and a probable HOFer in net in Khabibulin when he won in Tampa. I gave you his results since. He will not, at this rate, have similar talent in Philadelphia. His coaching style asks too much for too long from too many players. It leaves them drained before the playoffs even start. This isn't the first time this has happened. It's a good reason why he has been out of the first round once in the past 10+ years and no further. This isn't "a surprise" and I'm not "piling on" after they flamed out. It's been said about him by me and many others. If you want your middling bubble playoff team to be the best middling bubble playoff team out there, he's your guy. I don't believe he - or virtually anyone else for that matter - could win four seven game series against superior talent with hard work, grit, and determination.

Whatever will they do without the next Maksim Sushko, Connor Bunnaman, Mikhail Vorobyov, Tye McGinn, or Taylor Leier? That's the 235 games the Flyers have gotten from the 4th Round in the past 15 years. Your last "impact" fourth rounder was Radovan Somik in 1995. No, really. They lost a 4th Rounder. The horror. The horror. The problem is "making a playoff push" and "being ahead of schedule" in YEAR ONE of the "rebuild". YEAR ONE. "Doing it the right way".

I stopped paying a while ago. Then bought a game (Tippett's hatty) at the end of last season and it was fun. My wife likes the time out. We've gone a couple of times this season, one was the Gritty Section, which is not a place to "watch a game" but was really fun. And that's great, if you're looking to be entertained. It's a fun game. I started liking Finland not because they won in 1980, but because they lost (obviously). People came back because they bought into the idea that this was going to be different. If we want to be a fan of a mismanaged middling bubble playoff team with a highly talented Russian superstar winger, we could just go to the Wild forum. They missed the playoffs, too.

Oh, c'mon now, we had the greatest player in the world knock him on his ass and then score a goal - in the playoffs(!) - and that guy went on to become so successful and overwhelming as an influence on the league that his greatest achievements were the John Scott All Star Game MVP, the longest tenured captain in the history of the franchise, and a seven-time Toyota Cup three stars winner. The impact of that hit limited Crosby to three Cups, two Ross, two Hart, three Lindsey, two Messier, two Richard. and two Conn Smythes. As well as being named to the All Decade Team for the 2010s (second All Decade Team 2000s), and a five time winner of the A.T. Caggiano Memorial Booster Club Award (no, seriously). So, he really showed him. Hit him again...