radoran

3 minutes ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

Don't effin matter the will be right back here next year mediocre as hell...

 

In related news, water still wet.

Developing.

3 hours ago, GratefulFlyers said:

To put it in perspective we don't need tea leaves but we do - I do - need more than ACBA.

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.

4 hours ago, GratefulFlyers said:

 

I see. So it's basically a crap shoot. I accept that if we're talking about where the Flyers are now. But earlier in the season they played consistently good, fast hockey - goaltending was solid - and it wasn't a crap shoot at all.

 

Certainly ACBA is "the bottom line" it's just not very helpful.

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.

1 hour ago, GratefulFlyers said:

I offered a partial explanation for the result, namely how well Ersson played. But why he and the Flyers suddenly played so well, that's what I find interesting don't you?

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

3 minutes ago, GratefulFlyers said:

frankly I don't know what that was...and I have no idea if we'll see it again tomorrow.

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.

48 minutes ago, Brewin Flames said:

Sooner or later these overpriced contracts will bite them....

After how many more Cups?

47 minutes ago, GratefulFlyers said:

what a whackjob team....

 

I'd love to believe in the Flyers, in Jones/Briere and Tortorella but how can I? What kind of team spends weeks sabotaging their PO hopes then goes into MSG and beats maybe the best team in the NHL? Beats them convincingly too. This team makes no sense to me.

 

It's like a switch was flipped back to "ON" and last night they started playing professional hockey again. whackjobs...

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.

54 minutes ago, IllaZilla said:

Or a name that makes no sense, like the Utah Jazz. 

When was there any jazz in Utah?

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

19 minutes ago, jammer2 said:

With one year remaining, NOT buying out Atkinson would be GM incompetence. Open a spot for a youngster, spread out the cap hit and the fans don't have to see 20+ games without a goal again. Easy peasy. 

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...

50 minutes ago, Mad Dog said:

 Agreed.  That Montreal game was just a disaster, no matter from what angle you look at it. The team was unrecognizable.  It's almost like they didn't want to have anything to do with even being on the ice in that game.

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".

1 minute ago, JR Ewing said:

his style wears on the players and the message gets old after about three seasons.

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.

19 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

All I'm saying is that they're solid long-term players that we traded away to rent a washed up crap defenseman for 6 weeks

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.

19 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

or whatever for a lost cause instead of keeping it either to draft or use in a functionally cognitive way   (package with something for a better pick, package for a prospect, whatever).

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.

2 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

 

Yes, they should have. We'll see how you feel midway through his sparkling new contract. 

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.

Just now, flyercanuck said:

Heck Chuck Fletcher PROVED an idiot can get lucky with a late round pick

He didn't. Kaprizov signed after they canned Fletcher. Fletch didn't even sign him.

1 minute ago, flyercanuck said:

But the more you have of them, the better your chance is of striking gold.

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.

4 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

Well, there have been very successful picks in the 4th round

I mean, like your Pageaus, Copps, Nyqvists... Fantasy waiver wire types

I know you hang you hat on Erik Gustaffssoonnn and Johnny Hockey.

4 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

but it's the Flyers we're talking about so fair.

You should see how many years they don't have a 4th...

https://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/teams/dr00007439.html

35 minutes ago, icehole said:

But that's the point of my thread. Maybe it's too much to ask to get the right mix of players that will buy into his coaching style.

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.

3 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

for a 4th round pick.

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".

9 minutes ago, Mad Dog said:

What *is* insane is that people still pay money to go and watch the garbage they put on ice.... year after year. If fans stop paying money, something would change.

7 minutes ago, mojo1917 said:

Until last week they were pretty fun to watch.

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.

10 minutes ago, CoachX said:

also known as, "The day the Flyers were neutered". If more Flyers bytch slapped that little puss, the result wouldve been different

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...

19 minutes ago, CoachX said:

disregard...i just re-read @radoran POV

At this point they still don't need anyone over the age of 25.

They're stuck with some, but they won't win a Championship with them.

2 hours ago, icehole said:

Torts is a great coach

Is he, though?

A Cup 20 years ago, a Conference Final 12 years ago, 3 (total) division titles (the last, again, 12 years ago), one playoff round win in the past decade. In 20 years behind the bench, he's been out of the first round five times. He's missed the playoffs 9 times (going on 10).

What am I missing?

Torts can motivate a lesser talented group to play above their heads for a short period of time. He's a "good" coach.

He didn't magically get better when he donned orange and black.

And we're watching the fabled "culture" that he "rebuilt" get blown out 15-6 by teams that stopped sniffing the playoffs two months ago.

And it wasn't even that close.

57 minutes ago, SCFlyguy said:

apparently Little Danny Briere is dumb

It's like the guy who apprenticed under Bob Clarke's apprentice has the same tendencies that they did...

1 minute ago, Mad Dog said:

 

I am convinced they are hopeless and incurable at this point... Regardless of new faces, new brass, new narrative, new... everything, the MO will never change wit this team. It's frankly disgusting and nauseating. 

you would think your "definitely a playoff team" would be able to TCOB with bottom feeders like Montreal and Columbus in "a playoff push".

Instead they lose 15-6.

To Columbus and Montreal.

And we're "further along than we thought" and the "culture" is fixed and we have FALLEN IN LOVE WITH JOURNEYMAN WAIVER WIRE PICKUPS WHO ARE ESSENTIAL TO OUR CULTURAL REBUILD.

It's insane.