From The Athletic - Flyers Poll/Survey (Part 4) - Biggest Needs / Moving Forward / Biggest weakness

[CoachX]

11 hours ago, pilldoc said:

 

wanna take bets on over/under on how many games into the new season before JVR gets to eat popcorn in the pressbox ???

He may not even be here. 

 

Seems to me that the hype surrounding Torts is largely believed to be fact, even though much of it is opinion based. So if EVERYTHING is true, JVR should easily see he won't have any success in Philly, and should be working to get the hell out of dodge

[flyercanuck]

45 minutes ago, CoachX said:

He may not even be here. 

 

Seems to me that the hype surrounding Torts is largely believed to be fact, even though much of it is opinion based. So if EVERYTHING is true, JVR should easily see he won't have any success in Philly, and should be working to get the hell out of dodge

 

I think JVR counts his "success" 7 million ways a year. Pretty sure that's all he cares about.

[elmatus]

Hayes for sure. The other two will both be gone after this coming season anyway.

[pilldoc]

There are a couple of worthwhile takeaways from this one.

 

First, the relatively close split between the three vote shares hints that, well, fans think the Flyers pretty much need everything. And they’re not wrong. With Couturier and Kevin Hayes coming off injury-ravaged seasons, the team would certainly use another high-quality center. With Claude Giroux gone, there’s a big hole at wing. And given the uncertainty surrounding Ellis’ ability to return (and that Ristolainen probably isn’t a top-four quality NHL defenseman), the blue line corps would benefit in a big way from an infusion of talent too. The roster weaknesses entering the offseason are myriad.

 

But let’s go back to the top-four defenseman response, which received just under a third of the vote. It strongly hints that fans aren’t exactly buying that Ellis will be good to go for Game 1 of 2022-23 — otherwise, a top four of Ivan Provorov, Ellis, Travis Sanheim and Ristolainen is at least passable, to the point where top-four defenseman probably should be the lowest priority of the three. That it’s a clear No. 2 says that skepticism regarding Ellis status still very much remains.

[pilldoc]

 

We were 50/50 on gutting roster and standing pat ...

 

Hoo boy. It sure doesn’t look like our surveyed voters are going to be happy with the ultimate direction of the offseason.

 

In January, both Fletcher and Comcast Spectacor chairman and CEO Dave Scott articulated their plan for an “aggressive retool” this summer aimed at quickly returning the team to relevancy. Then, in May, during his end-of-season news conference, Fletcher appeared to amend that promise by comparing their likely play to more of what they successfully executed back in 2019 — the hiring of a well-established head coach and a few significant strategic adds without emptying the cupboard of prime future assets (though having a willingness to trade away some mid-tier ones). In other words, the “moderate retool.” Most likely, Fletcher is going to embark on one of those two paths.

 

And those are the two paths that our surveyed fans least want him to take.

 

Instead, the fans here would prefer a more future-oriented approach. An actual majority wants Fletcher to execute as much of a firesale as possible, trading away as many veteran and maybe even in-prime assets in order to stock up on draft picks, and position the team to potentially chase down Connor Bedard and the No. 1 pick in the 2023 draft. Next most popular is a stand-pat offseason, which would allow the Flyers to retain all of their assets while turning over the team to the young players remaining, and potentially also allowing the Flyers to be in the mix for a high draft pick.

 

Neither approach appears to be in the cards for the Flyers. So Fletcher will have to overcome significant doubt regarding the viability of his chosen path.

 

 

[pilldoc]

 

Two big takeaways on this one.

 

First, it’s clear where our surveyed group stands on the question of “Why aren’t the Flyers’ prospects developing as well as anticipated?” There are two possible explanations: either the prospects were overrated from the start, or the organization simply isn’t doing an effective enough job of fostering their strengths and putting them in positions to succeed. These fans very much land on the latter: 52.1 percent believe that player development isn’t just a bigger weakness than drafting — it’s the organization’s biggest weakness period. That doesn’t bode well for their optimism regarding a potential rebuild, either, because any rebuild would require another round of player development.

Huh, so that’s why people are so fatalistic about the Flyers right now.

 

Then, there’s the big discrepancy between those who believe the Flyers are too backward-thinking in their approach versus those who believe that they’ve lost the inherent Flyers-ness that made the organization special in the first place. By over a 7-to-1 margin, fans in this survey think the organization is too old-school in approach, as compared to not having enough respect for tradition and the past. This is likely driven by The Athletic’s audience, which tends to be more open to analytics and more long-term approaches than more mainstream channels, but it’s still worth pointing out that there’s a not insignificant section of the fan base that would like to see fewer Ristolainens and more of a full-fledged focus on skill and creativity.

[GrittyForever]

I got stuck on this poll for hours trying to click "all of the above" for most of these. 

[TropicalFruitGirl26]

Ok, so continuing today my outsider's POV on these Flyer questions....

 

For those that missed my post on Part 1, I like doing exercises like this, but waited till the bulk of the actual Flyer fans weighed in before I posted.
Once again, I won't vote so as not to skew the results of those who follow the team much closer than I do, but will instead just leave my takes in commentary form.

 

 

1. Entering the offseason, what do you see as the Flyers biggest positional need?

 

Oh boy. Where to start. One could reasonably argue any of those skater answers is legit....and go further, and throw in the starting goaltender if one thinks Carter Hart is mentally "cooked" by now.
Back up goalie? I wouldn't worry too much about that because getting a reasonably capable veteran goalie isn't that difficult to find in this league. Much depends of course, on what kind of team plays in front of said backup, but that, IMO, should be the Flyers' LEAST concern at this time, the backup netminder position.

I would say, in order to have a solid foundation, you'd want a top 4 defenseman, and that is what I would say is Philly's biggest area of need.
A team can sorta get away with, at least for a short while, not having a 1C or having a 2C like Coots play the role of a 1C....or having some other top 9 winger move up and play the role of a top six winger.
Not saying the Flyers DON'T need those things, because they do, but that with some smoke n mirrors, they can sorta fake their way through that in the short term.

I do NOT think they can do that with the defense. It is much easier for a bottom six winger or center to stand in as a top line center or top line winger for a bit, than it is for a bottom pair defenseman to impersonate a top 4 D-man. 
Defensemen who aren't really top 4 material, even MORE so if they are put on the top pair, are almost always immediately exposed.

Right now, Ivan Provorov was supposed to be that top pair guy, along with Ryan Ellis. Well, Provy has seemingly regressed, and Ellis, at this stage, doesn't look like a guy they can count on to even play a large amount of games (if any at all), and if he DOES, how effective will he be?

So if Philly can somehow, some way, get ahold of a top four defenseman (not sure what assets they would have to get one), then they should do it because THAT, IMO, is where they are really hurting with no way to mask the problem, as teams regularly abuse their defense pairings due to guys not slotted to where they are best suited.

 

 

2. What path, do you think, SHOULD the front office take right now in terms of overarching philosophy?

I don't believe in 'tanking'. Never liked it, I think its bad for team culture, morale, and bad for getting respect throughout the league. 
For some, that may not be important as long as they "get that high draft pick" or that "generational player", assuming there is one to be had.
But then, a team gets that high draft pick, and that draft pick sees the kind of culture that is there, and wants out.

Not the exact same thing, but take Jack Eichel for a second. Granted, Eichel didn't help the situation by striving to truly be the solution, but the Sabres didn't exactly put him in the best position to win. Many have said the Sabres purposely put out bad teams so they could get a player like Eichel. I don't know if true or not, but the result was Eichel was a good player (high maintenence, granted), on a horribly low morale saturated team.
Bottom line, tanking sucks, doesn't guarantee you anything, and just makes other franchises and other fanbases make fun of your team for it.

Flyers do NOT want to continue the stupid aggressive retool. It isn't working, and with certain contracts on the books, it isn't any time soon.

I'd opt for slowly turning the roster over to younger and younger players and allow them to grow together. If any solid vets want to stick around and help, great. For those that say, "but I don't want to be part of a rebuild", or "I am here to win now", then they can just waive their NMC's and the Flyers can see them to the exits.
Contrary to what some may think, there ARE some Flyers with value, which will hurt trading away in the short term, but if the return is nice, Philly could have the last word when all is said n done.

As for those "unmovable" contracts (ya'll know who they are), Flyers should explore options such as buy outs, trade with salary retention, or just ride out the contract if the years are less than two or three left. Whichever options helps out Philly the best, they should do. That WOULD require CF to be a bit creative, and that in itself is a special mission, but that is what I would go for: turning the roster over to the youth (ala the Ottawa Senators), they will lose many games (but lose 'honestly' while trying, which keeps integrity of the franchise intact), and that should net them some better players, assuming the front office can identify who they are and properly draft them.


4. What do you view as the Flyers BIGGEST Organizational WEAKENESS right now?

 

For this, I would have voted "Some of the Above".
Meaning I agree with the bulk of fans when they say the front office has and continues to do very badly in their transactions, but also, that Old School "The way the Flyers have always done it", seems to creep in and be in the way as well.

No one is saying the Flyers need to be cream puff figure skaters out there with no grit, but they DO need to realize that the league has moved to more speed, offense, and mobile defensemen, with the RIGHT amount of knuckledragger types put in there for support.
I really am not convinced this organization has embraced that kind of thinking and still try running the team like its the late 90's or early 2000's, and to that end, perhaps have guys like Travis Konecny or Sean Couturier play roles out of their character because they have no one else to properly fill the support roles while those guys should be given speedier and/or offense driven roles.

It's a fine line, because champions have a good mix of both finesse and grit (have a look at both current Stanley Cup Finalists, for example), but it seems Philly goes either too much one way or the other, without that mentality of balance that is needed to build a true winner.
So yea, IMO, poor transactions mixed with too much Old School dinosaur ways of doing things.