Thank God that's over

[mojo1917]

Here's a portion of Charlie O'Connor brilliant 21/22 post-mortem article.

Which brings us to the lingering old-school mentality in the organization, and the concept of “Flyers culture.”

Rasmus Ristolainen (Tim Nwachukwu / Getty Images)

The Ristolainen extension, especially, looms large as a symptom of this. For a team in the Flyers’ position — way down the standings and so far from contention that they would trade their longtime captain (and best player) just a few weeks later — the logical move would have been to ship out Ristolainen for picks and prospects. His value around the league was high, as a physical rental defenseman perceived by many GMs as having a game tailor-made for the postseason. Ristolainen’s pairing with Sanheim had been fine relative to the rest of the team, but far from dominant. It only made sense — bad team trades away expiring contracts for future assets.

Instead, the Flyers doubled down on him, paying him like a solid second pair defenseman when every objective metric grades him out as a third-pair guy at best. The reason? Well, it’s true that Fletcher has liked Ristolainen as a player dating back to his time in Minnesota. But it’s a near-certainty that Ristolainen’s size and physical style of play was a major factor. And it’s also a near-certainty that the older voices in the brain trust were very much in favor of bringing back a player who screams the traditional notion of what Flyers hockey should be. During a season where scoring is up to pre-neutral zone trap levels and offense and skill are very much in vogue, the Flyers are spending $5.1 million per year on a defenseman who embodies the opposite, from his throwback mentality to his consistently awful performance by analytics. In large part because of Flyers culture.

Which finally, at long last, brings us to ownership.

The current incarnation of Comcast Spectacor as run by Dave Scott has been under fire for years from traditionalist fans, annoyed by the emergence of Gritty, increasing ticket prices, a perceived lack of care toward longtime season ticket holders, among other offenses. But here, let’s stick to the decisions on Comcast’s part that directly impact the play of the hockey team.

And from this vantage point, it looks to me that Comcast is in the worst kind of middle ground: they desperately want to be loved the way that Ed Snider was, but due to their inherent corporate nature, they can’t be. And as a result, they’re not making anyone happy.

It was abundantly clear in the second half of the season in particular that they were paying attention to the critiques been throwing their way about not living up to the high standards set by Snider: the pageantry surrounding Giroux’s final game, the $400,000 donation to Snider Hockey to construct a new outdoor hockey rink in Kensington, the Lou Nolan 50th anniversary celebration, even Scott’s public pronouncement that he would pay the fine to allow Nolan to sit at ice level (in violation of the league’s COVID-19 policy) for his big night. It screams that Comcast cares very much about how they are perceived by the fan base at large. And that’s not a bad thing. Flyers culture means a lot to the fan base, and it can’t be tossed aside.

The problem is, when it comes to the hockey team, we’re getting all the bad parts of Flyers culture without any of the good. The people in charge are being allowed to sell that a Ristolainen overpay is necessary because the Flyers have to remain the Flyers. A rebuild apparently isn’t being considered at least in part because “it’s not what the Flyers do.” But those drawbacks — overpays based on intangibles and a win-at-all-costs mentality that often led to counterproductive, short-term thinking in the past — aren’t being counteracted by the best parts of the culture: the heart-on-sleeve sincerity from ownership (impossible from a corporate entity, particularly in this day and age), Snider’s big personality and unscripted honesty, the aggressive, star-hunting roster moves that signaled to the fans that the team truly was always going for it, and finally, the unmistakable perception that the people at the top really, truly care. Recent shifts aside, that’s just not there anymore for a not-insignificant part of the fan base.

And that’s why it’s not just the losses that made this the worst season in franchise history. It’s because there isn’t a level of this organization that doesn’t appear to be failing at their jobs right now. It’s because things are bad, and despite the “aggressive retool” concept pitched by Fletcher and Scott in January, there’s not a lot of hope that they’ll be getting better anytime soon.

No one’s jobs should be safe in the wake of this disaster. That’s not to say that every single member of the organization should be fired; that’s sports talk radio nonsense. But it is to say that every single aspect of the organization — ownership, management, scouts, development, medical staff and, of course, the players — need to be given a thorough evaluation. No longer can it be assumed that anyone is obviously good at their job simply because they’ve been here for decades or played for the team or just is extremely likeable personally.

This isn’t working. None of this is working. And the last thing the Flyers need right now is a reaffirmation of the status quo that put them in this predicament in the first place.

Last offseason, after his first attempt at aggressively retooling the roster, Fletcher delivered a telling quote. “You know what, we just can’t keep bringing the same players back year after year and expect different results,” he said.

And he was right. But he didn’t go far enough. Instead of “players,” he probably should have used the word “people.” The talk over the next few days will likely surround the idea of aggressively retooling the roster. The truth is, though, the entire organization needs to be aggressively retooled. Obsolete mentalities need to be rooted out. Accountability needs to be re-implemented. Flyers culture doesn’t need to be destroyed, but it does need to be reworked to fit the realities of modern hockey.

And if it’s not, “miserable” seasons like 2021-22 are destined to become the new status quo here in Philadelphia.

 

There's more to the post than that. I thought this was an excellent summation of this team's failures this season.

[pilldoc]

8 minutes ago, mojo1917 said:

A rebuild apparently isn’t being considered at least in part because “it’s not what the Flyers do.

 

^^^^ This x1000 ^^^^

 

This is exactly the mentality that has plagued this team for the past decade.  It should read "its not what the Flyers do" to ----> "It's what the Flyers HAVE TO DO!"

 

Quite frankly I don't give a damn about Flyers history any more.  It's no longer about the Broadstreet Bullies, or the Flyers vs Soviets in 76, or Kate Smith singing "God Bless America".  Nice memories ...of course, I became a Flyers fan because of a lot those fond memories.   But that is what they are ....just memories.  The NHL is NO longer played that way. Simply put, the NHL changed and the Flyers did not.

 

I'm sick of the mantra..."that's not what the Flyers do" or "that's not Flyers hockey".  Screw that.  

 

I want a team that is going to win on the ice, by outskating and out working the other team.  Period.  I want a team to a least make it to the Conference Finals first then eventually back to the SCF.  The new NHL is about speed and skill and an influx of younger faster players with the right amount veteran players.

 

The Flyers NEVER adapted and in large part that has to do with the FO and the dinosaur mentality they still have.  

 

This article is spot on.  I still DO NOT understand why Risto is still on this team.

 

18 minutes ago, mojo1917 said:

This isn’t working. None of this is working. And the last thing the Flyers need right now is a reaffirmation of the status quo that put them in this predicament in the first place.

Last offseason, after his first attempt at aggressively retooling the roster, Fletcher delivered a telling quote. “You know what, we just can’t keep bringing the same players back year after year and expect different results,”

 

Then why the hell are you bringing back Risto .....  Inquiring minds want to know ...

 

20 minutes ago, mojo1917 said:

The truth is, though, the entire organization needs to be aggressively retooled. Obsolete mentalities need to be rooted out. Accountability needs to be re-implemented. Flyers culture doesn’t need to be destroyed, but it does need to be reworked to fit the realities of modern hockey.

 

^^^^ this x 1000 ^^^^

 

Many of us on here have been saying this for years and the FO refuses listen or change their collective thought process.

 

As many of us have said ...until the FO changes their mentality I would expect more seasons like this past one and they will eventually see a decline in Flyers interest in this city if it has not already happened.

 

 

Great article @mojo1917 ...thanks for sharing/posting.

 

[OccamsRazor]

How fitting this bum scores in the LAST meaningless game of the year...

 

 

 

One of the top priorities of the offseason...

 

 

...unscrambling Ivan and Hart's heads must be done this offseason.

 

Finding a coach who can return these guys to the form we got excited about.

 

I have been discouraged with pretty much every aspect of this team this season. I guess a big reason it was record setting.

 

I guess all they are worried about is FORE!!!!!

 

[mojo1917]

@pilldoc

I know you and a few others subscribe to the Athletic. So I feel less bad about lifting the pay wall than I did the first time. 

 

Charlie has been a fair voice about the team this season. 

 

This article is perhaps the best he's written this season.  Giving space for the injuries but still calling the 2 Fletcher off season's moves/ lack there of the failures they have been. 

It's bad luck but also flawed design and execution.

I hope somewhere  someone with juice has a plan to revamp the team. 

What's happened the last 4 seasons in particular is not acceptable. 

 

 

 

[pilldoc]

1 minute ago, mojo1917 said:

I know you and a few others subscribe to the Athletic. So I feel less bad about lifting the pay wall than I did the first time. 

 

I have no problem with it ....as long as we give credit to the Athletic, I treat it like any other article.  I don't do it all the time.  Only when there is a really good article that everyone would benefit from.  I know some sports forums frown upon it, but as far as posting it here on HF.net we don't have any hard fast rules against it.

 

Truthfully, The Athletic has some wonderful articles as the writers really dig into team issues.

[mojo1917]

@OccamsRazor

Most JvR stat of all...? that goal was #24.

Just shy of the number that has value in trade discussions. 

It is a perfect encapsulation of his Flyers career.

A skillfull play in a meaningless game that falls short of benefiting the team in any fashion. 

 

[flyer4ever]

1 hour ago, OccamsRazor said:

How fitting this bum scores in the LAST meaningless game of the year...

 

 

 

One of the top priorities of the offseason...

 

 

...unscrambling Ivan and Hart's heads must be done this offseason.

 

Finding a coach who can return these guys to the form we got excited about.

 

I have been discouraged with pretty much every aspect of this team this season. I guess a big reason it was record setting.

 

I guess all they are worried about is FORE!!!!!

 

Provorov and Hart will continue to be indifferent as long as management continue to bring in overpaid overaged players. They will care when management pulls their arrogant, ignorant, stubborn heads out of their asses. They should be begging to get the hell out of Dodge while they still are in their prime.

[GrittyForever]

What I see in that article is pretty much spot on. 

 

Team's a mess, a total disaster, and they are going to stay the course and it'll  be a mess next year too. 

[GratefulFlyers]

re: Ristolainen at the TD O'Connor says:

 

Quote

- the logical move would have been to ship out Ristolainen for picks and prospects. His value around the league was high, as a physical rental defenseman perceived by many GMs as having a game tailor-made for the postseason.  

 

IIRC Fletcher had already resigned Ristolainen a few weeks before the TD, in effect taking him off the market. GMs weren't going anywhere that 5-year/$25mil contract. But even before Fletcher resigned him moving Ristolainen was never going to happen. O'Connor is right the Flyers like him they value what he brings.

[SCFlyguy]

6 hours ago, mojo1917 said:

Flyers culture doesn’t need to be destroyed

Wrong.

[icehole]

The problem with the Charlie O'Conners of the world bashing Flyers culture is that the culture they bash is the culture that brought winning. This isn't Flyers culture that we're seeing today. This is Hextall's mess that Fletcher tried to fix, but he isn't doing a very good job. They both have completely different approaches. Neither one is wrong, but neither of them was able to make the right moves. Hextall failed at building through the draft, and Fletcher failed at signing the right FAs.

They need to get back to Flyers culture. Maybe the smart move for the franchise would be to build slowly and not spend money on high price FAs. I can't wait through that though. I'm 41 and need to see some winning soon.

My brother showed me a Facebook post showing when teams like Carolina and Florida were picking at the top of the draft. He was basically saying that things will turn around like it has for those teams. That post was from 2013. If the flyers turn it around like those teams did, they'll be good when I'm 50. That's really depressing. 

[pilldoc]

1 hour ago, icehole said:

They need to get back to Flyers culture.

In your opinion what exactly is “back to Flyers” culture? Please define what that culture looks like? Thanks….

Edited April 30, 2022 by pilldoc

[mkscrewy]

Anyone else want to offer an assessment to Flyers Management of what also isn't "Flyers Hockey"?

 

 

Edited April 30, 2022 by mkscrewy

[flyercanuck]

1 hour ago, icehole said:

If the flyers turn it around like those teams did, they'll be good when I'm 50. That's really depressing. 

 

 The sad thing is it'll never turn around the way they're doing it. The ceiling for this management is middle of the pack. They suck at signing free agents, they suck even more at trades and their drafting is decent at best. Guys can preach about Fletcher getting Kaprizov all they want...that's ONE stud player in 11 drafts. That's not good drafting. And getting that player in the 5th round shows it was just a fluke.

Edited May 1, 2022 by flyercanuck

[mojo1917]

14 hours ago, flyercanuck said:

Guys can preach about Fletcher getting Kaprizov all they want...that's ONE stud player in 11 drafts.

Maybe I'm wrong, but doesn't that current team have 8 Fletcher/Flahr picks playing for it?

Also, Fletcher did not part with thier now top 3 defenseman- When there was temptation aplenty to try to save his bacon.

I don't like always defending the guy *Fletcher*but when the dog pile is full of crap I do feel like someone should speak up.

 

He's flawed and his moves haven't worked here. He is not the root of the problem, he's definitely a symptom though.

 

 

Edited May 1, 2022 by mojo1917

[GrittyForever]

It's funny (and I was inspired to this because of Risto) but I went and looked around at Sabres year end stuff for comparison. We all know they've been the doormat of the league for years and a lesson in what not to do BUT now (with Risto and Jack-hole and others gone) everybody on that team is bonding and they are excited and optimistic and they have prospects galore and were winning at the end of the year and it's all positive for next year. 

We seem to have swapped places, and so maybe we need to learn from that and do what they did. In other words, burn it all down and reboot. 

They won't of course, but that's what I'd do. Strip it ALL away.

 

[CoachX]

14 hours ago, pilldoc said:

In your opinion what exactly is “back to Flyers” culture? Please define what that culture looks like? Thanks….

I was going to ask the same question. I'm curious to hear the answer

[mojo1917]

@icehole

I'm wondering if you missed most of the article's point ?

Sometimes I'll see something in an article that shuts out the flow of information because it made me angry. 

I know you're not going to tell me the last 2 years of Flyers hockey have been successful, fun and interesting. 

My take away from this article was there is a disconnect between reality and the perceived "Flyers way" aka culture. 

This team hasn't played "Flyers hockey" since the Lindros era, almost 25 years ago. The league, players and team have all changed dramatically since then. Where the culture is getting in the way is by failing to recognize this and adapt. 

From the types of players the organization picks to the insistence that a roster of mismatched and middle talent players can be fixed with a shrewd move or two. Those ideas are hold overs from a time that is long past. 

 

 

Edited May 1, 2022 by mojo1917

[CoachX]

When a franchise leaves dinosaurs in control, and those dinosaurs are incapable of adapting, the consequence will be failure. As a comparison, look what happened to the Raiders under Al Davis. In a league that is evolving and changing, you need people who can evolve with it. The Flyers are like my father in law, who can't figure out why his flip phone can't connect to the internet

 

Just prior to the trade that brought Eric Lindros, the Flyers were unwatchable. I think, as bad as they are now, the excuses are hollow and the damage is obvious. They have no choice but to change direction

 

I think I'll have hope

[pilldoc]

18 hours ago, SCFlyguy said:

On 4/30/2022 at 10:29 AM, mojo1917 said:

Flyers culture doesn’t need to be destroyed

Wrong.

 

Care to elaborate more on your thought process here and why you feel like this?   Thanks.

[mojo1917]

@SCFlyguy

Organizational cultures are vast systems made up of many components. 

Your post can be interpreted many ways.

For example, part of the Flyers culture has been to be positively engaged in the community, that needs blown up?

What about treating players well ? That is something the team is known for around the league.

Creating a family atmosphere for players and alumni ? 

Organizational culture is more than Clarke and Homer telling the scratched d-man to put more butter on the popcorn.

 

Your answer makes it seem like those positive things the Flyers do and are need to go too...I'm sure that's not what you mean.

 

[icehole]

On 4/30/2022 at 7:54 PM, pilldoc said:

In your opinion what exactly is “back to Flyers” culture? Please define what that culture looks like? Thanks….

I apologize if I didn't read this from Charlie, but when I hear "change Flyers culture", it usually refers to Paul Holmgren, Bobby Clarke, and Ed Snider. It's about getting away from hiring ex flyers to run the team. It's about getting away from the physical game the Broad Street Bullies were known for. It's about thinking they're too slow and unskilled to compete.

 

The flyers have changed that culture, and that puts them where they are today. I have a hard time wanting to change that culture when it brought winning and excitement. Clarke and Holmgren made some big mistakes, but I was excited for any one of those teams more than any of the flyers teams I've watched since Hextall started to rebuild it. The 2012 flyers looked like they were on fast forward compared to 2022. The team hasn gotten slower, less physical, and less skilled since then. But everyone was excited at the time because Hextall brought a new culture from his time in LA.

And now, there are some that want to move even further away from the old flyers culture. They don't want Rick Tocchet as coach because he played for the flyers. They don't want Danny Briere as GM because he played for the flyers. Those two guys might not be qualified for the job, but don't discard them because they played on the team. I sure would love to have that guy that coaches Carolina.

 

So my idea of flyers culture is exactly what the flyers did before Hextall. There's nothing wrong with it and it worked. They don't have to be afraid to be physical either. There's a reason Ryan Reeves always seems to find a winning team. There's a reason Pat Maroon has won a few cups. There's a reason Florida had a fight last week. Physicality still has a purpose. Fletcher may be trying to add that with a player like Risto, but he hasn't done a very good job at it. Risto can be physical but he doesn't have the energy level, speed, or smarts to be effective. 

[CoachX]

2 minutes ago, icehole said:

It's about thinking they're too slow and unskilled to compete

They are. Problem is, they aren't physical either

[icehole]

1 hour ago, CoachX said:

They are. Problem is, they aren't physical either

Exactly. People associate physicality with slowness. So now that they aren't physical, they must be fast and skilled right? The previous culture had toughness and skill. They never had a ton of speed.

[icehole]

On 5/1/2022 at 10:59 AM, mojo1917 said:

@icehole

I'm wondering if you missed most of the article's point ?

Sometimes I'll see something in an article that shuts out the flow of information because it made me angry. 

I know you're not going to tell me the last 2 years of Flyers hockey have been successful, fun and interesting. 

My take away from this article was there is a disconnect between reality and the perceived "Flyers way" aka culture. 

This team hasn't played "Flyers hockey" since the Lindros era, almost 25 years ago. The league, players and team have all changed dramatically since then. Where the culture is getting in the way is by failing to recognize this and adapt. 

From the types of players the organization picks to the insistence that a roster of mismatched and middle talent players can be fixed with a shrewd move or two. Those ideas are hold overs from a time that is long past. 

 

 

I guess that's where my idea of "Flyers Hockey" differs from others. These past years have not been fun, and it definitely wasn't Flyers hockey. But I don't think it ended in the Lindros era either. They played tough up until Hextall came in. Emery rag dolling holtby. Simmonds was once the most feared fighter in the league. Rinaldo (everyone's favorite) could really hit.

I believe that's what Charlie and others are trying to get away from. You can be fast and skilled and keep toughness. You can hire ex flyers and be successful. I just hate when they bash a style that brought lots of fun and success to this organization. In my opinion they have gotten away from Flyers hockey, and that's why they are where they are.