Flyers to Retire Lindros' 88

[ruxpin]

11 minutes ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

That is horseshi!t. When did that trade happen 91?

 

They were in the finals in 96-97. 

 

There was no salary cap. You could just buy your team. 

 

Let's just be honest. Clarke was a suck ass GM. And he showed it many times.

 

Signing Gezzer instead of Joseph in net was one of his biggest ones.

 

Even keeping Hextall when they brought him back and he couldn't stop a beach ball...then having Snow back him up.

 

Yikes. Trading for Oates. Too many to name.

 

June 1992

 

It's not horseshit.   At all.   This is what they traded:

 

Steve Duchesne
Peter Forsberg
Ron Hextall
Kerry Huffman
Mike Ricci
$15M cash 
1993 1st round pick (#10-Jocelyn Thibault) 
future considerations (Chris Simon 1994 1st round pick (#10-Nolan Baumgartner)) 

 

Asside from several very good players in Forsberg, Ricci, Simon, and Duchesne, they trade two first rounders and $15M.   It's pre-cap, but there's only so much you can legitimately do with 4 offseasons when you've completely raped your organization for Captain Nipple Lips.  What's actually amazing is that they put as much around him as they did.     It took the Penguins 7 years with Mario Lemieux to reach the finals (and win, by the way).    The Flyers got to the finals (and had pretty good seats to watch) in 5.   Even in the non-cap era, it's not as easy as you're pretending it to be.   I mean, this is the same non-cap era organization that  missed the playoffs for 5 consecutive years.

 

Joseph?   What the hell did Joseph ever win?  People like to play this game with that, but the result would have been no different.  We may not have had the same clown car we were icing in net for the finals in 1997, but Joseph was as overrated as Johnny V.   I mean, honestly, Mike Vernon wasn't all that and certainly didn't win those finals.

 

That trade was a mistake of epic proportions.  It was when it happened and the ultimate result plays that out.   They gutted an organization for a Baby and his parents who had already twice proved what kind of human waste they were.

[OccamsRazor]

1 hour ago, ruxpin said:

 

June 1992

 

It's not horseshit.   At all.   This is what they traded:

 

Steve Duchesne
Peter Forsberg
Ron Hextall
Kerry Huffman
Mike Ricci
$15M cash 
1993 1st round pick (#10-Jocelyn Thibault) 
future considerations (Chris Simon 1994 1st round pick (#10-Nolan Baumgartner)) 

 

Asside from several very good players in Forsberg, Ricci, Simon, and Duchesne, they trade two first rounders and $15M.   It's pre-cap, but there's only so much you can legitimately do with 4 offseasons when you've completely raped your organization for Captain Nipple Lips.  What's actually amazing is that they put as much around him as they did.     It took the Penguins 7 years with Mario Lemieux to reach the finals (and win, by the way).    The Flyers got to the finals (and had pretty good seats to watch) in 5.   Even in the non-cap era, it's not as easy as you're pretending it to be.   I mean, this is the same non-cap era organization that  missed the playoffs for 5 consecutive years.

 

Joseph?   What the hell did Joseph ever win?  People like to play this game with that, but the result would have been no different.  We may not have had the same clown car we were icing in net for the finals in 1997, but Joseph was as overrated as Johnny V.   I mean, honestly, Mike Vernon wasn't all that and certainly didn't win those finals.

 

That trade was a mistake of epic proportions.  It was when it happened and the ultimate result plays that out.   They gutted an organization for a Baby and his parents who had already twice proved what kind of human waste they were.

 

 

Yeah what did Jon VanGeezbrook ever win?

 

We do not agree and i'm fine with that.

 

But the whole team was poorly mismanaged but good luck with pitting on the top line center if it makes you feel better.

[ruxpin]

3 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

Yeah what did Jon VanGeezbrook ever win?

 

We do not agree and i'm fine with that.

 

But the whole team was poorly mismanaged but good luck with pitting on the top line center if it makes you feel better.

 

I think we probably agree on more than we think; just coming to different conclusions.  And that's fine.

 

Johnny V. didn't win jack.   He was only "okay," but certainly overrated by Flyer management.   At least the sales pitch by the front office overrated him, anyway.

 

And I completely agree that the whole team was poorly mismanaged, though when I put it in the context that it took the Pens 7 years to build around Lemieux and the Flyers only 5 really (I said 4 above, but I counted wrong) to get to the finals with Lindros, maybe we're being a little unfair.   The Desjardins/LeClair deal was brilliant, but we could both probably list 10-15 deals that were "wtf?"   Right?   Gratton comes to mind.  Both of them. 

 

Not to be captain obvious, but I guess where you and I differ is that I would include the Lindros deal itself in the mismanagement category.   I'm not pinning lack of a Cup on Lindros.   I think that goes squarely into the "poorly mismanaged" category.    I know many found him fun to watch -- and despite the fact I never really liked him he was often fun to watch!    But I think with a better general manager they would have been better served by the package they traded away.

 

Just as a throw away:   It's really easy to say that the Avs got two cups and Philly got none so the Lindros trade was dumb.   But while that, to me, was contributing, the other clearly obvious thing was that the Avs went and got Patrick Roy while the Flyers got...what week are we talking about?

[AJgoal]

Just now, ruxpin said:

Just as a throw away:   It's really easy to say that the Avs got two cups and Philly got none so the Lindros trade was dumb.   But while that, to me, was contributing, the other clearly obvious thing was that the Avs went and got Patrick Roy while the Flyers got...what week are we talking about?

 

And don't forget where the Avs got Thibault to be able to use him in the trade...

[AJgoal]

6 minutes ago, AJgoal said:

 

And don't forget where the Avs got Thibault to be able to use him in the trade...

 

My own counter to that is the Avs also had Sakic and Foote and Ozolinsh that they kept around. That certainly helped.

[ruxpin]

35 minutes ago, AJgoal said:

 

My own counter to that is the Avs also had Sakic and Foote and Ozolinsh that they kept around. That certainly helped.

 

Yeah, agreed.

And the Flyers had Brind'amour and Recchi and.....really very little else.   You know the history. Recchi became Leclair/Desjardins, blah blah blah.   But the point is well made.

 

But they went from a completely WTF roster in 1991-92 to the SCF in 1996-97.  The semis the year before.  S,o I mean there was a bit of heavy lifting there.     But I agree with OR and everyone else about mismanagement.  It certainly wasn't the team the Avs put together (from that trade and from unrelated sources).   I just include the Lindros trade as ultimately one of the examples of mismanagement.  Not that he wasn't skilled or whatever.   Just that it had the effect of leaving the rest of the team a big fat hole with no real assets to fill it with and because he and his family had already shown in pretty flagrant terms what schmucks they could be.   Twice.

[AJgoal]

Just now, ruxpin said:

 

Yeah, agreed.

And the Flyers had Brind'amour and Recchi and.....really very little else.   You know the history. Recchi became Leclair/Desjardins, blah blah blah.   But the point is well made.

 

But they went from a completely WTF roster in 1991-92 to the SCF in 1996-97.  The semis the year before.  S,o I mean there was a bit of heavy lifting there.     But I agree with OR and everyone else about mismanagement.  It certainly wasn't the team the Avs put together (from that trade and from unrelated sources).   I just include the Lindros trade as ultimately one of the examples of mismanagement.  Not that he wasn't skilled or whatever.   Just that it had the effect of leaving the rest of the team a big fat hole with no real assets to fill it with and because he and his family had already shown in pretty flagrant terms what schmucks they could be.   Twice.

 

I don't disagree, though I like Lindros a heck of a lot more, apparently. To add to the mismanagement, The Flyers only made 5 first and 5 second round draft choices in the 8 years Lindros was with the team, and only netted 4 notable NHL players in the top 2 rounds: Niinimaa, Boucher, Zubrus, and Gagne. 

[King Knut]

11 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

Well that isn't all Eric's fault.....the front office could have got him better teammates....like some defensemen and a goalie to start.

 

Then another line besides his.

 

It's all the Wings had to do was shut down one line....which they did and they were swept...

 

Their D wasn't that bad.  Rico, Therien, Niinnima, Coffey (though he was ancient), Dykhuis, Svoboda.  They weren't bad at all.   Haller and Samuelsson needed to play too much though.  

 

What's so weird about their bottom 9 is that there were some players that ended up being really good for other cup winning teams but aside from Rod, none of them did much for these Flyers.   Hawerchuck and Otto were beyond his years, but Podein, Zubrus, Prospal (pretty good 2nd and 3rd liners for years to come).  Add in the "shoulda beens" like Druce and Falloon (even as they didn't live up to expectations, they should have been serviceable 2nd and 3rd liners), and frankly I'm tempted to say they underperformed on the whole as opposed to being all just bad.  Trent Klatt should not be your 2nd line scoring wing on that team.  But he was.  

 

Hextall and Snow were actually pretty good too.  Even by the standards of the era their GAA numbers were pretty good and their Save % were average.   It was more their timing than that they were just bad.  They'd give up a soul crushingly soft goal at exactly the wrong time in the biggest game of the season.  I'm guessing Hextall's age caught up with him by the end of the season and a friend of mine (who was not a Flyers fan) theorized that Snow had a drinking problem based on the way he looked out there some nights.  

 

 

[fan4ever]

@ruxpin

 

What, no comments on "Captain Nipple Lips"?  I can't believe that!  Too funny!!!!!!!!

[fanaticV3.0]

I don't care about this kind of stuff anymore, even when it's deserved. I'm sick of the fake ceremonies from this organ-I-zation. Good for him, probably deserved, don't care.

 

[fanaticV3.0]

On 8/28/2017 at 3:10 PM, King Knut said:

 

 

I still believe that if Bobby Clarke had not been the President and later GM, and had he been handled in the manner we are used to seeing young supserstars handled now, Lindros would have had a long career and would now be heralded as one of the great all time players.

 

 

 

I didn't know that Bobby Clark had the power to collapsed lungs and give concussions from his seat up and management's suite.

[ruxpin]

50 minutes ago, fanaticV3.0 said:

 

I didn't know that Bobby Clark had the power to collapsed lungs and give concussions from his seat up and management's suite.

 

It came free when he ordered the Tony Robbins "Power to Walk on Water" superpack.

[King Knut]

52 minutes ago, fanaticV3.0 said:

 

I didn't know that Bobby Clark had the power to collapsed lungs and give concussions from his seat up and management's suite.

 

He had the power to help prevent them and he did not.  

He had the power when Eric came into the league and onto the team and acted as Eric's professional Mentor, to mentor Eric to protect himself a bit and pressure the team to do the same.  "Eric, they're going to be gunning for you hard.  Keep a look out and on occasion, it's okay to avoid the hit instead of trying to absorb it all like a super human punching bag. This team needs you on the ice scoring goals more than it needs you to prove you're tough."

 

That's it.  

 

They gave up a lot to get him.  How do you not take immediate measures to protect that investment?  

 

 

[King Knut]

5 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

It came free when he ordered the Tony Robbins "Power to Walk on Water" superpack.

 

From a certain point of view, they're all walking on water aren't they?  or skating on it anyway.  

 

But from a metaphorical point of view, from the way the organization and the community at large treats Bobby, you'd think walking on actual thawed water is something he'd mastered long long ago.

[King Knut]

2 hours ago, fan4ever said:

@ruxpin

 

What, no comments on "Captain Nipple Lips"?  I can't believe that!  Too funny!!!!!!!!

 

It was a road I didn't want to go down... Especially when I extrapolated it to what parts of the female anatomy Captain Richards and Captain Giroux would eventually earn themselves nicknames as captains.

 

 

 

 

[ruxpin]

4 minutes ago, King Knut said:

 

From a certain point of view, they're all walking on water aren't they?  or skating on it anyway.  

 

But from a metaphorical point of view, from the way the organization and the community at large treats Bobby, you'd think walking on actual thawed water is something he'd mastered long long ago.

 

Funny, that crossed my mind when typing it but hit "submit reply" anyway.   LOL   Both of your statements are very true.

[ruxpin]

2 minutes ago, King Knut said:

 

It was a road I didn't want to go down... Especially when I extrapolated it to what parts of the female anatomy Captain Richards and Captain Giroux would eventually earn themselves nicknames as captains.

 

 

 

 

 

I wouldn't have gone with a female body part, but otherwise fair point

[fanaticV3.0]

16 minutes ago, King Knut said:

 

He had the power to help prevent them and he did not.  

He had the power when Eric came into the league and onto the team and acted as Eric's professional Mentor, to mentor Eric to protect himself a bit and pressure the team to do the same.  "Eric, they're going to be gunning for you hard.  Keep a look out and on occasion, it's okay to avoid the hit instead of trying to absorb it all like a super human punching bag. This team needs you on the ice scoring goals more than it needs you to prove you're tough."

 

That's it.  

 

They gave up a lot to get him.  How do you not take immediate measures to protect that investment?  

 

 

 

Have you ever actually blamed the player  – and not management – for his poor play?

[King Knut]

16 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

 

I wouldn't have gone with a female body part, but otherwise fair point

 

Well not in Giroux's case, but each has a rather notorious reputation for totally different reasons from each other (or Eric) to be associated that way.

[King Knut]

32 minutes ago, fanaticV3.0 said:

 

Have you ever actually blamed the player  – and not management – for his poor play?

 

When a player plays poorly, yes I do.  If you read my posts, I'm pretty consistent and fairly objective in my observations.

That objectivity sometimes gets slammed as prejudiced one way or the other.  

 

In this particular case, Eric needed to skate with his head up... but when you look at a lot of the really damaging hits that ended up shortening his career, he was doing absolutely nothing wrong.  The Kasparitus hit Both Kasparitus and Stevens would be suspended for the most notorious hit if it happened today.  Having his head up would have achieved little in either situation. The Kasparitus play, he didn't have the puck and hadn't for a while.  He wasn't admiring his pass, he was looking for the puck, which is what Kasparitus is supposed to be doing in that situation too.  On the Stevens hit, he couldn't have raised his arms to brace himself anyway as he was making a play.  Stevens comes from the blind side (opposite to where Lindros is playing the puck) and nails him in the chin.  The only way Lindros could defend himself on either his was to not be doing his job as a hockey player, to stop trying to make plays and assume his only job on the ice is to defend himself.  

 

what I suggest is that if Clarke (When assigned by the Flyers to mentor Lindros when they acquired him) had suggested he do a bit more of this sort of self protection then, maybe he would have taken it to heart.  But this assumption that Eric was admiring his passes and what not is utter bunk.  If you watch the plays again, the only way for him to be defending himself is to not be trying to win. 

 

There were other totally clean hits (the one in Boston that he was recovering from when the Stevens hit happened) but really the medical facts are that the situation had already been tee'd up by this point.  This is just the way with Concussions.  If they're not dealt with slowly and cautiously, they leave a player vulnerable permanently.  

 

What Lindros was going through on the ice was NOT NORMAL.  Seriously... how many players around the history of the league have almost died (were it not for the heroics of a sleepy Keith Jones) from a collapsed lung?  He was being targeted by dangerous and illegal hits (even by the standards of the day) for most of his career and his team did little to nothing to protect him.  Kasparitus should have left that game in '97 on a stretcher.  Worse than that, someone on the Flyers should have made sure Jagr didn't finish the game either.  

 

It's ugly, it's barbaric, but if a team is going to target the health of your player, if you're not going to protect him because it's the right thing to do as a human being, you should at least do it for the heartless calculating reason of protecting your damn team's interests.  

 

The fact that neither Clarke nor the Flyers as an organization were making this a priority shows just how self deluded they all were about all of their precious achievements in the 70's.  Most of the hockey world viewed what was happening to eric and those flyers as Karma for the Bullies.  

 

 

 

 

[King Knut]

33 minutes ago, fanaticV3.0 said:

 

Have you ever actually blamed the player  – and not management – for his poor play?

 

As for the player's poor play... he was the most dominant player of his era and brutalizing him or hooking him and grabbing onto him was the only way to stop him.  

 

The harshest criticism I have for his play is that he never learned to prioritize protecting himself (but clearly I'm putting some blame on management there) and that he allowed himself to be clutched and grabbed and hooked into submission in the playoffs when the refs pocketed their whistles on all that stuff as well as the dirty hits.

 

He could have just beaten the hell out of Claude Lemieux, Konstantinov, Stevens, Danyko and all those a holes.  One cross check to the teeth or one shift a period in which Eric decided to not try to win the game and send a few messages and maybe they win those cups and he has a long healthier career.  

 

But unlike Giroux or Voracek, his play didn't just drop off.  He had a boat load of help.  

 

As it is now, the team drafted Lindblom, Strohme and Radcliffe and fully acknowledged /acknowledges that they couldnt'/ cant skate.  Then they invested in helping them skate better.  It's what kept Lindblom from the early rounds, but he worked on it intensely and is now a pretty good skater and looks to be on the verge of making the NHL.  All rookie camp, Strohme was just skating skating skating skating.  

 

They identify these problems and they COACH them to figure out how to improve their flaws for the benefit of the team.  

 

How is working with a superstar you gave up the middle 1/3 of your team, a draft pick and $15 million for too much to ask of an organization?  

 

How is asking the goons you put on the 4th line (that was still a necessary thing back then and the Flyers usually had at least 2) to murder anyone who touched Eric too much to ask for when they were only out there to eventually do that to someone each night anyway?

 

A bit of blood.  A little bit of nastiness.  Some lost teeth and broken jaws in 1992-1995 and the Lindros and the Flyers are a much more successful team from 1996-200? .

 

As far as holding the players accountable, I noted in a different post in this thread that the popular idea on this board that aside from the Legion of Doom line, the Flyers were a bad team is complete bunk as well.  They were a well built team for the era.  Their middle 6 SHOULD have been very good.  Far better than the Devils that perpetually beat them.  Not as good as the Redwings or Avalanche though... but their Defense was not as bad as we think either.  They were actually a pretty good squad comparatively.  

 

The difference between the Flyers and the teams that beat them was simple:  Brodeur, Roy, Osgood, Cujo and Hasek.  vs. Hextall and a 29 year old Snow.  

 

 

 

 

[RonJeremy]

Clarke wasn't responsible for Lindros skating with his head down and getting laid out by Kasperitis and Stevens. As seen with his brother Brett, it seems the Lindros brothers have some sort of predisposition to concussions. Of course their rugged style of play would certainly add to that. 

[RonJeremy]

@knut,  during the Lindros era ,aside from our mediocre goaltending being a big reason we lost  ,another big factor was a lack of depth and skill on the blue line. We had only  one real legit defenseman , Desjardins and he was always overused and worn down by seasons end. Lindros did take a lot of abuse and was held,hooked, bear hugged ,etc without penalties called...in today's game he would be unstoppable, but since he is big , he would still never get the calls like that little pu ssy Cindy Crosby would get, but he certainly would have a lot more room than in the 90's era

[Buffalo Rick]

Whenever we played against him Mike Robataille referred to him as "Big Lindros" and boy he always praised him.  Who knows what he may have done if not for injuries.  He was a wrecking machine when healthy

[King Knut]

On 9/1/2017 at 7:14 PM, RonJeremy said:

@knut,  during the Lindros era ,aside from our mediocre goaltending being a big reason we lost  ,another big factor was a lack of depth and skill on the blue line. We had only  one real legit defenseman , Desjardins and he was always overused and worn down by seasons end. Lindros did take a lot of abuse and was held,hooked, bear hugged ,etc without penalties called...in today's game he would be unstoppable, but since he is big , he would still never get the calls like that little pu ssy Cindy Crosby would get, but he certainly would have a lot more room than in the 90's era

 

Yeah,  I kinda beg to differ on the D men thing.  They certainly weren't elite, but they were better than we say.  Good in fact.  Just not great.

 

By and large the offense behind Lindros, LeClair and Brindy underperformed for their talent level.  I detailed this in another post, but these were good players who did well elsewhere before and for a long time after those years.  

 

I think on the offense it was a rare combination of some of them still being green for the sort of game they played (Podein, Prospal, Zubrus) and some of them just never being able to put it together for long (Falloon, Druce) and some were just old (Hawerchuck, Otto).

 

But between Rico, Therien, Niinnima, Coffey (though he was ancient), Dykhuis, & Svoboda... that's a pretty solid D corps.  

 

Samuelsson was too old (POKE CHECK!) but performed better than he should have at that time.  Haller was even half decent for them and if he's the worst guy on your team, you're doing okay.  

 

Maybe the coaching never really paid attention to the bottom 6?  I don't know.  Fact is, Legion of Doom aside, the team should probably have been better than it was based on the secondary talent.