Building just like Hexy/Lombo did?

[icehole]

8 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

Wow you can see all that right??

 

So tell me what the lotto numbers are while you're at.

This was in response to what @radoran posted.  Though Holmgren didn't have great success, he did put together exciting teams that won some playoff rounds.

 

I feel (not know) that Hextall's rebuild has the potential to maybe have the same success, but it will take much longer and the fans will go through pointless suffering.  Unless of course you are enjoying what you see out there...

[icehole]

8 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

What does it matter how they won them??

 

They won Cups!!!

 

Please if the Flyers ever win a Cup don't be THAT guy who bitches about the score or the fact that Ghost was Homer's draft pick and Giroux was drafted by Clarke.

 

Who cares the win is all that matters.

This entire thread is about Hextall rebuilding through the draft.  My disdain for Hextall is all about his patient philosophy and gathering draft picks.  I think the article was trying to align Hextall with rebuilding LA through the draft which led them to 2 cups.

 

LA didn't win the cups by rebuilding through the draft though.  Their drafts were actually terrible.  I know some later round picks had mediocre success, but you have to hit on your high picks to have success.

 

LA actually won because of existing talent combined with free agent signings and trades for NHL talent...not draft picks.  That must have been Lombardi because we see what Hextall does in the free agency/trade market.

[OccamsRazor]

3 hours ago, icehole said:

Unless of course you are enjoying what you see out there...

 

 

I have watched some however i have found other things to do when the game is on and i'm not glued to the set like i use to because i have come to the understanding that they are going through some rough growing pains.......and it could get uglier before it gets better.

 

You have a young coach and a young team. I suggest you find something else to watch as well.

[OccamsRazor]

3 hours ago, icehole said:

My disdain for Hextall is all about his patient philosophy and gathering draft picks.

 

 

And that is so flawed off the bat. You're judging his work before he is done. Turrible way to go about things. Good luck with that.

[mojo1917]

4 hours ago, icehole said:

LA didn't win the cups by rebuilding through the draft though.  Their drafts were actually terrible.  I know some later round picks had mediocre success, but you have to hit on your high picks to have success.

 

You are right about hitting on your first round draft picks, if you hit on those guys it speeds the process.  It helps to have great players available in the draft year too. 

But everywhere else I cannot disagree with you more.

 

The Lombardi / Hextall drafts weren't "terrible" they got their defense, 3rd line and a couple of guys that moved up and down the roster in those drafts. They did draft Martin Jones, NHL starting goalie, Jonathan Bernier NHL starting goalie.  Good role players, big, fast, smart, players filled that organizations roster.

 

The core of that Kings team was created through the draft, the depth to be able to trade "the best player not in the NHL" for Mike Richards was because of drafting well...Wayne Simmonds was considered the 'throw in '...hello?  That the roster was filled with key contributors from within the organization is a testament to the Kings ability to draft NHL players.  

 

Their AHL teams were consistently excellent, if an NHL guy got hurt, here's another guy just like him that plays the same game and he costs less.  That is the not-so-obvious benefit of amassing talent.  Maybe the guys they drafted weren't Sidney Crosbys but they were good players who learned how to win and contribute in a winning environment. 

 

It will take time, ideally, this club will have a long open window where they are able to win championships because there is a plethora of good to very good players to draw from to fill spots and use in trades to acquire missing pieces.  

 

[Podein25]

4 hours ago, icehole said:

My disdain for Hextall is all about his patient philosophy and gathering draft picks. 

 

Thank Christ you're not the GM

[King Knut]

On 12/2/2017 at 9:20 AM, flyercanuck said:

So CSN Philly knows how long a rebuild should take?

 

 I'd hate it if Hextall won 2 cups in Philly....I'd prefer the Holmgren way of trading  your young assets away and fluking your way into a final in a shootout on the last game of the season and watching the worst goaltending duel in playoff history unfold.

 

I miss those illustrious careers we watched of Syvret/Modry/Versteeg that only cost us 2-1sts and a 3rd...and getting to watch Bryz turn the Flyers org. into the punchline of the biggest joke in the NHL....while Bob turns into a Vezina winner ....good times.

 

 Hextall may not be turning this franchise around in record time. But at least he isn't leaving it in shambles with some of the worst contracts in the entire league.

 

Yeah, I'm not sure the two things have much in common with each other. Right off the bat this analysis is kind of ignoring the magic tricks Hextall pulled off to essentially double the number of draft picks for this team-something he did while moving no desirable assets (the one desirable asset he moved was in the name of getting cap relief three years sooner).  

 

As far as the draft goes, he's already done better here than what happened in LA.  The thing about LA's rise was that they had guys entering their prime (Kopitar, Brown, Quick) and cap room to make some vital moves that made them Champions (Carter, Richards, Williams).  

 

At the same time, he's ignoring how the Kings actually won.  They did it without any one player scoring a ton of goals or points.  

 

in 2014, Kopitar finished with 29G and 70P and Carter with 27G and a mere 50P... not bad really, but wouldn't we be freaking out if that's what our best players were producing?  Yes... we would because we have been for several years.  

 

2012 was pretty much more of the same except Brown cracked 20 goals that year and Williams approached 60P.

 

As pitiful as the Flyers offense was last year, it scored more goals than the Kings did in either of their cup winning seasons.  

 

My point is that the looking at the number of points the Kings draft picks under Hextall and Lombardi put up is missing the point.  They won with defense and a fantastic goalie.  

 

Now look at what the flyers are doing.

 

Provo, Hagg, Sanheim, Morin, Friedman, Myers... all highly rated defensive prospects.

Hart, Sandstrom, highly highly rated goaltending propsects. 

 

Vecchione, Frost, Rubstov, Vrobyov... these are guys that are heralded for their hockey sense and two way accumen.  

 

Lindblom, Strohme, Radcliffe... these are guys that are projects for one reason or another.  High upside, but time and effort needs to be invested, but if they can put it in, these guys have the potential to punch well above the weight class of the rounds they were drafted in.  

 

Now when Hextall is in his 5th ot 6th season as GM, even if he has the cap room, I don't think he'll NEED  to bring in whatever the equivalent of Justin Williams, Mike Richards and Jeff Carter will be to help put this team over the top.

 

But the long and short of the analysis is that the KINGS needed players the Flyers discarded in order to get over the top. 

Right now, despite the deceptive streak, I'm just happy the Flyers are no longer the team tossing aside "over the top" players left and right for 5 years straight in the name of... wait why did we trade all those guys again?

 

 

[icehole]

4 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

And that is so flawed off the bat. You're judging his work before he is done. Turrible way to go about things. Good luck with that.

Maybe it is, but when is he done?  When can you start to judge and criticise the moves he's made? 

 

I am judging every player Hextall acquired that isn't helping the team right now.  If a player is too young or inexperienced to make the team, I don't want to hear his name...he's a nobody right now.  I can't judge him as a bad player and you can't judge him as a good player.

 

Talking about a future of unknowns (good or bad) is a waste of time...dont you think?  Can we talk about Patrick, Hagg, sanheim, provorov, or Koneckny yet?  Do they need to reach a certain age before I can give my opinion on how they're playing?

 

As soon as you step on the NHL ice, you are expected to help the team win.  If you are not helping the team win, you are not doing your job.  You might do the job later, at which point I will say good job.  If enough of Hextall's guys are doing their job, that's when I'll say Hextall has done a good job.

 

The last I checked, they just got out of a 10 game losing streak.  Is Hextall doing a good job?

 

 

[mojo1917]

58 minutes ago, icehole said:

Can we talk about Patrick, Hagg, sanheim, provorov, or Koneckny yet?  Do they need to reach a certain age before I can give my opinion on how they're playing?

3

oh absolutely.

I don't think it's fair though, to look at those players today and think "that's all they're gonna be,  Hextall sucks, so do they, why aren't these guys awesome, it's been 30 games...?"  My favorite example, Duncan Keith, wasn't DUNCAN KEITH until he was in the league a couple of years. So wouldn't it be fair to judge Patrick, Sanheim, Hagg, Provorov and Koneckny  knowing they will most likely improve, and if they're in the league at 19, 21, 22, 23, 20 they're probably damn good already ? 

 

[Podein25]

1 hour ago, icehole said:

Talking about a future of unknowns (good or bad) is a waste of time...dont you think? 

 

And yet here you are doing it!

 

By the way, do you know if these are known unknowns or unknown unknowns? If not, do you know anybody who might know?

[icehole]

8 minutes ago, Podein25 said:

 

And yet here you are doing it!

 

We are?  I don't know what everyone else is doing, but I'm talking about knowns...unless people still consider drafts that Hextall was involved in back in 2007 to 2013 unknowns, which is completely possible.

 

 

[aziz]

10 hours ago, icehole said:

This entire thread is about Hextall rebuilding through the draft.  My disdain for Hextall is all about his patient philosophy and gathering draft picks.

 

in fairness to hextall, i don't know that it is HIS philosophy.  i think the at-times extreme failure of the clarke/holmgren approach generated a very loud consensus among fans and beat media that a pure-draft approach was needed.  i'm not sure hextall is doing much more than what was demanded of him by the people that pay the bills (the fans) and the people that decide if he keeps his job (the media).  which, fair enough.

 

the risk with a mandated mandate like that is a lack of nuance, contextless adherence to a simple-minded plan:  picks are better than players, weaknesses in the roster should be addressed by thin stop-gaps until a prospect can take the spot, success today is irrelevant, future potential is king.  there is no gauge of success while a team isn't trying to be successful, no measuring stick to use if the mandate is "we don't care if we win now, just give us hope for the future."  especially when the "now" in that statement refers to the current moment, whether that moment was a year ago or 2 years from now.  there will come a time when the fans and the media start demanding results "now", but that is way down the road, several years, and i don't see the flyers changing their approach until that happens.  and it'll likely be years after that before the results happen, because that's when the building of a coherent team will actually begin.

 

as you mention, this means that flyers hockey isn't going to be fun, in the normal way, for the foreseeable future.  it isn't supposed to be.  the team has been told to stop trying to build a competitive squad in anything resembling the shortterm, it is all about the collection of maybes.  and that's where the fun comes from, if you are into it:  watching this huge pile of prospects develop and hoping they turn into something special.  for myself, that isn't enough.  i've never thought a strip-it-bare rebuild is a good or productive approach.  mortaging significant portions of the future for short term gain isn't a good idea, either, but a middle ground is possible.  having steered the flyers into pit lane without an apparent roadmap or timetable for leaving it, I'm just not interested, and totally get that you aren't, either.  it sucks, man, but this is what was demanded.  as was said by someone else, you are just gonna have to find something else to do/care about.

[flyercanuck]

2 hours ago, icehole said:

Maybe it is, but when is he done?  When can you start to judge and criticise the moves he's made? 

 

 Who do you prefer right now...Provorov, or Pronger? 

 

2 hours ago, icehole said:

 

I am judging every player Hextall acquired that isn't helping the team right now.  If a player is too young or inexperienced to make the team, I don't want to hear his name...he's a nobody right now.  I can't judge him as a bad player and you can't judge him as a good player.

 

Ya, we get it...you'd prefer to have Pronger and all those great years he once had filling up a huge chunk of the cap than what is clearly an up and coming top pair defenceman. There's a cap now....you can't buy a cup. And Philly never did. Even though they tried for two decades. As did the Leafs...for four.

 

2 hours ago, icehole said:

 

Talking about a future of unknowns (good or bad) is a waste of time...dont you think?  Can we talk about Patrick, Hagg, sanheim, provorov, or Koneckny yet?  Do they need to reach a certain age before I can give my opinion on how they're playing?

 

 Absolutely....if you're not a big picture kind of guy. There's not a team in the league that wouldn't love to have Patrick/Hagg/Sanheim/Provorov or Konecny. Are they good players yet? Nope. But anyone with hockey sense can see they all have potential to be.

 

2 hours ago, icehole said:

 

As soon as you step on the NHL ice, you are expected to help the team win.  If you are not helping the team win, you are not doing your job.  You might do the job later, at which point I will say good job.  If enough of Hextall's guys are doing their job, that's when I'll say Hextall has done a good job.

 

The last I checked, they just got out of a 10 game losing streak.  Is Hextall doing a good job?

 

 

 

 If we both started building a house at the same time, but yours was already half built and brand new, and my property had an asbestos mine/lead smelter on it that I had to demolish and then start building, would it be fair to say you're doing a better job than I am cause you were done sooner? 

 

 Holmgren basically left Hextall an asbestos mine/lead smelter to demolish before he could build his new home. 

[OccamsRazor]

2 hours ago, icehole said:

Maybe it is, but when is he done? 

 

 

It's his job. He will never be done till he quits or is fired. However the Cup(s) is the ultimate goal.

 

However in the new salary cap era you must combine the two the draft with free agency.

 

The foundation should be laid with kids you draft and free agency should be used to plug holes.

 

It isn't an exact science.

 

However he must weigh the chance to add a good talent sometimes that say is further along and ready to help when he sees fit.

 

 

Example of giving up picks or younger prospects that may have just been drafted or are several years away from being ready.

 

And it is always easier sitting in our chair and being able to judge.

 

Yet this is the new norm and the reason for having a deep farm system with the cap the front office must decide with limited caps space or who is worthy of being resigned or who isn't and either moved or just let walk and then replaced with younger talent that is ready to replace talent that isn't brought back.

 

A perfect example of what i'm talking about is on the horizon come next year. It is Simmer a fan favorite. Come next year in August he will turn the ripe ol age of 30 and also in the last year of his deal.

 

And then they have a big decision to make?? Should they give him a new deal??? Or for should they trade him and if so when?? Come July 1st??? Or wait till closer to the trade deadline?? A hard one to make but he must.

 

So now you ask yourself well who do we have who is ready to replace him at RW??

 

A quick look tells you come next year Aube-Kubel will be in his last year of his ELC. But that is about the only pure RW down there close.

 

However i expect at the end of this college season you will see Wade Allison (will be 21 next year) come out and sign his ELC. Yet he will need at least one year in the AHL if not more.

 

You have more guys at RW but just are further away from helping. David Kase, Olle Lycksell and Maksim Susko to think of.

 

So maybe you go free agency?? Find a younger cheaper option (a stop gap for a year or two) or just resign Simmer.

[OccamsRazor]

17 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

 

 Who do you prefer right now...Provorov, or Pronger? 

 

 

Ya, we get it...you'd prefer to have Pronger and all those great years he once had filling up a huge chunk of the cap than what is clearly an up and coming top pair defenceman. There's a cap now....you can't buy a cup. And Philly never did. Even though they tried for two decades. As did the Leafs...for four.

 

 

 Absolutely....if you're not a big picture kind of guy. There's not a team in the league that wouldn't love to have Patrick/Hagg/Sanheim/Provorov or Konecny. Are they good players yet? Nope. But anyone with hockey sense can see they all have potential to be.

 

 

 If we both started building a house at the same time, but yours was already half built and brand new, and my property had an asbestos mine/lead smelter on it that I had to demolish and then start building, would it be fair to say you're doing a better job than I am cause you were done sooner? 

 

 Holmgren basically left Hextall an asbestos mine/lead smelter to demolish before he could build his new home. 

 

Excellent post!

[Clarke2Leach]

8 hours ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

 

And that is so flawed off the bat. You're judging his work before he is done. Turrible way to go about things. Good luck with that.

Agreed and I would point to the Winnipeg Jets as an example of how the patient, slow build will bear fruit more quickly than you think.

 

[OccamsRazor]

39 minutes ago, Clarke2Leach said:

Agreed and I would point to the Winnipeg Jets as an example of how the patient, slow build will bear fruit more quickly than you think.

 

 

Great example.

[King Knut]

1 hour ago, aziz said:

 

in fairness to hextall, i don't know that it is HIS philosophy.  i think the at-times extreme failure of the clarke/holmgren approach generated a very loud consensus among fans and beat media that a pure-draft approach was needed.  i'm not sure hextall is doing much more than what was demanded of him by the people that pay the bills (the fans) and the people that decide if he keeps his job (the media).  which, fair enough.

 

the risk with a mandated mandate like that is a lack of nuance, contextless adherence to a simple-minded plan:  picks are better than players, weaknesses in the roster should be addressed by thin stop-gaps until a prospect can take the spot, success today is irrelevant, future potential is king.  there is no gauge of success while a team isn't trying to be successful, no measuring stick to use if the mandate is "we don't care if we win now, just give us hope for the future."  especially when the "now" in that statement refers to the current moment, whether that moment was a year ago or 2 years from now.  there will come a time when the fans and the media start demanding results "now", but that is way down the road, several years, and i don't see the flyers changing their approach until that happens.  and it'll likely be years after that before the results happen, because that's when the building of a coherent team will actually begin.

 

as you mention, this means that flyers hockey isn't going to be fun, in the normal way, for the foreseeable future.  it isn't supposed to be.  the team has been told to stop trying to build a competitive squad in anything resembling the shortterm, it is all about the collection of maybes.  and that's where the fun comes from, if you are into it:  watching this huge pile of prospects develop and hoping they turn into something special.  for myself, that isn't enough.  i've never thought a strip-it-bare rebuild is a good or productive approach.  mortaging significant portions of the future for short term gain isn't a good idea, either, but a middle ground is possible.  having steered the flyers into pit lane without an apparent roadmap or timetable for leaving it, I'm just not interested, and totally get that you aren't, either.  it sucks, man, but this is what was demanded.  as was said by someone else, you are just gonna have to find something else to do/care about.

 

This is an excellent point Aziz. Patience kind of came with the territory.  

 

The approach to the draft and getting picks for dead weight is a recipe for ENDURING success.  Homer and Clarke before him seemed to view draft picks like they were radioactive.  Hence they perpetually NEEDED to sign and trade for players (usually past their prime) just to fill out the roster.

 

Hextall's ingenuity with trades has been phenomenal.  The worst trade was the Umberger Hartnell deal and judging by the fact that the team wasn't competing WITH Hartnell either, and by the fact that Columbus eventually bought him out 2 years early, it becomes clear that Hextall really did do it just to get 5 million off the books 3 years sooner.  

 

His signings leave a little more to be desired.  Jake's is the big one I could complain about.

 

I won't even complain about Weise becasue for the player that was in Montreal, his contract is a pretty good deal.  

I'm good with most of the others.  We don't need to mention Boyd Gordon... he's gone.  We can all move on.  

[aziz]

15 minutes ago, King Knut said:

The approach to the draft and getting picks for dead weight is a recipe for ENDURING success.

 

well, no.  i think you may have misunderstood my post.  its a recipe for waiting and seeing what happens.  that's it, that's what the team is doing right now.  "wait a few years and see what happens, maybe we'll be great and maybe we'll suck tons o' ass, we'll just have to see, we're just gonna let things stew for a while."  which strikes me as a really...lame way to go.  before, at least, the flyers would go deep into the playoffs now and again.  that isn't even a possibility now; the team is paper thin in terms of NHL talent (the idea being the kids will become NHL talent sooner or later). 

 

you are right, though, patience is built in to the plan.  if you demand 17 yearolds be the focus of your club, you better be ready to wait for 7 or so years to find out what you have.  and you might have a great thing.  or you might have nothing at all.  but you'll have to wait a long time to find out.

 

19 minutes ago, King Knut said:

Homer and Clarke before him seemed to view draft picks like they were radioactive.

 

i think they viewed them like i do:  they are, individually, long shots to do anything worthy of note (top 10 picks notwithstanding).  keep enough of them and the odds are that you'll end up with something nice, but "enough of them" could be years and years and years worth.  or, you might get several keepers in the same draft class.  it's a game of chance, nothing more.  if a die roll can be traded for a known effective player with years left on his tires, making that trade is the better call literally 75% of the time. there is every possibility that hextall's trade of schenn for lehtera and picks ends up netting the flyers lehtera, and nothing more.  as an example.  two die rolls picked up there for one known effective player, so that one is probably 50% of working out in the flyers' favor.  still not a good bet.

 

trading that die roll for someone with no tread left on their tires is, obviously, an even worse idea.  i know.  and holmgren/clarke did that more than once.

 

 

[mojo1917]

2 hours ago, aziz said:

  the team has been told to stop trying to build a competitive squad in anything resembling the shortterm, it is all about the collection of maybes. 

I don't see this season as a tank, this sentence implies you do ?

To me a tank would include Giroux , Voracek and Simmonds traded for prospects and a handful of picks "magic beans" I believe you like to call them.

 

FWIW I think Hextall has tried a middle path but some of his attempts to game the system and get value from the middling signings haven't worked out as he envisioned. That happens, Medvedev (the defenseman) could have been a "gem" but he was more meh... I truly don't think Hextall envisioned a lazy ass, stupid-playing Dale Weise when he signed him. I do think the signing of Elliot was a lateral move with some hope that getting Mason and his mercurial personality someplace other than the Flyers dressing room could be addition by subtraction.  Schenn never seemed to fit here, I remember where your opinion used to lie with regard to #10.  Hextall maybe miscalculated Lindblom's readiness for NA hockey after seeing him succeed in the SHL.  

I think it's fair to say Hextall's attempt to walk the middle path hasn't been successful so far, but I do think there has been an attempt to ice a competitive team.

I don't agree that this season is akin to anything near what their Wells Fargo Center roommates spent the last 5 years doing.

 

[King Knut]

35 minutes ago, aziz said:

 

well, no.  i think you may have misunderstood my post.  its a recipe for waiting and seeing what happens.  that's it, that's what the team is doing right now.  "wait a few years and see what happens, maybe we'll be great and maybe we'll suck tons o' ass, we'll just have to see, we're just gonna let things stew for a while."  which strikes me as a really...lame way to go.  before, at least, the flyers would go deep into the playoffs now and again.  that isn't even a possibility now; the team is paper thin in terms of NHL talent (the idea being the kids will become NHL talent sooner or later). 

 

you are right, though, patience is built in to the plan.  if you demand 17 yearolds be the focus of your club, you better be ready to wait for 7 or so years to find out what you have.  and you might have a great thing.  or you might have nothing at all.  but you'll have to wait a long time to find out.

 

 

i think they viewed them like i do:  they are, individually, long shots to do anything worthy of note (top 10 picks notwithstanding).  keep enough of them and the odds are that you'll end up with something nice, but "enough of them" could be years and years and years worth.  or, you might get several keepers in the same draft class.  it's a game of chance, nothing more.  if a die roll can be traded for a known effective player with years left on his tires, making that trade is the better call literally 75% of the time. there is every possibility that hextall's trade of schenn for lehtera and picks ends up netting the flyers lehtera, and nothing more.  as an example.  two die rolls picked up there for one known effective player, so that one is probably 50% of working out in the flyers' favor.  still not a good bet.

 

trading that die roll for someone with no tread left on their tires is, obviously, an even worse idea.  i know.  and holmgren/clarke did that more than once.

 

 

 

Every time I try to like you Aziz, you gotta go off and be a malcontent for no good reason.  It's adorable. 

 

Clearly a constant replenishment through the daft has to be successful to be successful path to enduring success.  That's kind of a given.  

 

Youre not acknowledging the situation Homer created and brought in Hextall to wipe up after. Bad contracts for ineffective vets and a lack of ANY prospects in the system due trading draft picks like a fireman tosses candy at a parade meant that Hextall literally couldn't sign anyone and had only undesireable players to deal in trade. 

 

A different team with a different cap situation could have made some moves to bring in better talent sooner and THEN used the draft to replenish.  

 

Hextall had ONLY the draft to replenish while he worked his tail off to unload some of those deals with damn near impossible trades.  It's boring or lame to you... it was the only option available.  

 

He will have to make a big trade if this team doesn't turn things around.  But you seem to think that teams are dying to trade their 40 goal guys for Andrew MacDonald and VLC. 

 

You and I also have different definition of "an effective player".  Schenn found a home on the PP last year but was in fact an ineffective player at even strength.  He was an effective PP specialist.  He needed a change in scenery and two of the best players in the league. 

 

Maybe if they'd moved him to 1C   He'd be doing what Coots is this year, except he was a terrible center when they tried him there so why would they have tried it?

 

 

[pilldoc]

On 12/2/2017 at 8:17 AM, icehole said:

I was reading an article from CSN philly.  They were talking about the flyers rebuild and how long it should take.  They talked about Chicago, but they focused on LA because of the Hextall connection.

 

Lombardi took over in 2006 and Hextall came on board in 2007.  It starts by saying that Brown, Kopitar, and Quick were already acquired by the previous GM (ok...now you can Google who that was).  I didn't know that and it got my attention.

 

So I looked into their draft picks during their rebuild that led them to two cups.

 

2006 Jonathon bernier-11th (backup goalie)

Trevor lewis-17th (7&11 points in the 2 cup years)

 

2007 Thomas hickey-4 (never made the team and was picked up by NYI off waivers)

 

2008 Drew doughty-2 (that was a tough decision.  Stamkos was probably the only one close to Doughty, and he went #1)

colten teubert-13 (played 24 games in NHL...none with LA)

 

2009 Braden schenn-5 (traded 2 years after draft.  How dumb is that to deal young talent for proven players...right?)

 

2010 Derek forbort-15 (who?)

 

2011 Christopher gibson-49 (again...who?)

 

2012 tanner pearson-30 (7 points in 2014 cup season)

 

2013 some Russian name I've never heard of.

 

Now, I don't give credit to Hexy for winning the cups so I'm not going to blame him for things that didn't go so well.  But do these drafts make the Hexy/Lombardi duo the masters of the rebuild?  Are the flyers developing Jonathon bernier, trevor lewis, Thomas hickey, colten teubert, Derek forbort-15, Christopher gibson, tanner pearson-30 to be contenders in 5 years.

 

Wow, that gets me excited!

 

 

 

 

Not sure  where you got all your information, but you certainly cherry picked the aforementioned players.  I suggest highly you read this article:

 

https://www.cbssports.com/nhl/news/stanley-cup-final-how-the-los-angeles-kings-were-built/

and this article:

https://www.sbnation.com/nhl/2014/6/14/5801568/2014-stanley-cup-final-los-angeles-kings-roster-analysis

 

Let's start right off the bat ....

 

"Franchise building is something of a mad-science experiment. There's no one formula that yields 100 percent successful results, so it requires changing up the ingredients until, finally, one particular recipe does the trick"

 

So please explain to me where the system of Clark and Homer have won the Flyers a Stanley Cup?   I'll make it easy for you ...you can't.  Nobody can because the formula Homer and Clarke were using simply was not working. 

 

You say would wanted high priced free agent vets.  Guess what ..they did.  Did Briere them a cup. Nope.  The brought back Forsberg. Did he win them a cup? Nope.  They brought in Pronger..Did he bring them a cup? Nope (Sadly he was injured by a freak accident and ultimately forced to retire)

 

Of the 21 players that have played more regularly this 2014 postseason for Los Angeles, 11 were drafted by the organization, seven were acquired via trade and only three were signed as unrestricted free agents.

 

The team had a good start, building off of first-round draft picks Dustin Brown (13th overall in 2003), Anze Kopitar (11th overall in 2005) -- both selected before Lombardi took over the club in 2006 -- and Drew Doughty (second overall in 2008). Jonathan Quick was selected 72nd overall in the third round in 2005 (also pre-Lombardi).

 

The team also has former first-rounders Trevor Lewis and Tanner Pearson on the roster and had a lot of success in the mid-rounds as well. Tyler Toffoli, Slava Voynov and Kyle Clifford were second-round picks. Game 7 overtime hero Alec Martinez and Dwight King were fourth-round choices.

 

You failed to mention several of those picks in your post.  Toffoli , Voynov, Clifford were all 2nd round picks!  Imagine that...actually using a 2nd round pick to draft a player to help your team.   Clarky and Homer traded those picks like they were a hot potato and diseased and wanted nothing to do with them.  And you wonder why the Flyer farm team was in shambles????

The are article also goes on to point out the following .....

 

"To be as good as the Kings, it does take a little luck, like a franchise goaltender slipping to 72nd overall, or your No. 2 defenseman (Muzzin) not getting signed by the team that drafted him, or certain guys running afoul of their previous franchise. It takes skill to make those lucky bounces count.

 

It also takes development. <--------- (NOTE THIS PART!)      Eleven of the current LA Kings regulars first played for the Manchester Monarchs, the Kings’ American Hockey League affiliate. Their minor league system continues to feed into their NHL roster, providing cheaper, but NHL-ready talent. That’s a huge advantage to any organization that can boast such a steady stream of players between the two entities."

 

For years the Flyers minor league system was the joke of the league.  Piss poor drafting and piss poor management of the cap and draft picks left the Flyers farm system in utter shambles.  (Please don't give me crap about the Phantoms winning the Calder Cup in 2005.  Though nice it was during the NHL lock-out season and many of the players on that team would have been on the Flyers and to boot many other teams / franchises were in the boat)

When Hexy came aboard there was nothing in the farm system.  So Hexy had not one but two jobs!  First he had to restock the farm with quality talent and second do all that while attempting to field a quality competitive product on ice.  In regard to the first item of business, Hexy has done a masterful job at restocking the farm team.  Per many Hockey experts, the Flyers now boast one of the top rated / top prospects farm teams around. 

 

Finally all teams needs good coaching to take the roster that has been built and fit it within the right system, making sure the lines are structured properly to get the best results.  The jury is still out on Hexy to see whether Hakstol is a good for this team.

 

23 hours ago, icehole said:

Does this give me confidence in Hextall rebuilding through the draft...absolutely not.

 

so you are saying you prefer Homer and Clarky's version / philosophy of building a cup team ????

 

23 hours ago, icehole said:

What am I saying wrong here?

 

Quite frankly what is wrong is that you and many other Flyer fans (not those on this forum but on social media sites like FB) are impatient.  There I said it.  You want instant gratification and instant success in a sport that takes time for players to develop.  Look I'm sorry if Homer and Clarky screwed your plans of seeing a parade before you are 50 (ok I don't actually know how old you are but you get the point).  Their way of dealing in the NEW NHL has been proven to be unsuccessful. It takes smart business moves, shrewd player personnel moves and some luck along the way to win the Stanley Cup.  In recent history, prior to Hexy, the Flyers have had none of that. 

You do realize up until a few years ago this team was devoid of any real NHL talent capable of winning a championship.  So Hexy, in a probable conversation with Ed before he passed, said something similar to this in his interview .... "Mr. Snider, I have a plan.  It is similar to the one Dean and I had in LA.   I have a short term plan, I have a mid term plan, and I have a long term plan.  I will try to keep this team competitive, but there will be many bumps and curves along the way....BUT I will do my best to get the CUP back to Philly."

 

23 hours ago, icehole said:

The difference is that Holmgren took big risks that usually brought excitement to the team

 

VLC and Bryz say hello.....they were BIG TIME RISKS and they were BIG TIME MISTAKES!  You seriously want history repeated? 

 

You may hate Hexy because he does not make the flashy free agent moves . You may hate Hexy because he is tight lipped about a great many of things.  Hell you may hate Hexy for some of the trades he has made.  That is your right as a fan.  You want a championship team within 2 years, but that simple may not happen and that is life.  

 

23 hours ago, icehole said:

For the record, I couldn't care less if they never win a cup again

 

I'll end with this....so why are you fan then?  Inquiring minds want to know.......

[OccamsRazor]

10 minutes ago, pilldoc said:

Quite frankly what is wrong is that you and many other Flyer fans are impatient.  There I said it.

 

That is weird that came up and tagged me like i said that.

 

Strange i think you meant that for icehole.

 

And i agree i said the same thing to him ealier in the thread except you did a better job.

 

Not sure why he refuses to acknowledge the other picks that were not 1st rounders that had a hand in the Cups.

 

However icehole seems jaded and as you said wants to cherry pick parts that he wants to use to make his point.

 

However most of us won't let him him get away with it.

 

I've pretty much stated my part and i'm done with it.

[pilldoc]

2 minutes ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

That is weird that came up and tagged me like i said that.

 

Strange i think you meant that for icehole.

 

And i agree i said the same thing to him ealier in the thread except you did a better job.

 

Not sure why he refuses to acknowledge the other picks that were not 1st rounders that had a hand in the Cups.

 

However icehole seems jaded and as you said wants to cherry pick parts that he wants to use to make his point.

 

However most of us won't let him him get away with it.

 

I've pretty much stated my part and i'm done with it.

 

OMG ... I am so sorry ....I hit the quote button and I thought for sure it was for Ice.  Yes he is very impatient and that was the premise of my post.  So sorry it reflected back on you...it was not meant for you at all ......

[pilldoc]

10 minutes ago, OccamsRazor said:

 

And i agree i said the same thing to him ealier in the thread except you did a better job.

 

Not sure why he refuses to acknowledge the other picks that were not 1st rounders that had a hand in the Cups.

 

However icehole seems jaded and as you said wants to cherry pick parts that he wants to use to make his point.

 

However most of us won't let him him get away with it.

 

I've pretty much stated my part and i'm done with it.

 

I'm pretty much one and done ...just needed to get a few things off my chest.  I feel his pain though ... like you and me, we all want the the Flyers to achieve the holy grail.  However what Homer and Clarky were doing simply was not working in this era of NHL hockey.  It sucks it will take time, but it is what it is ...... gotta see this through to the end.