Showing posts with label Philadelphia Flyers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Philadelphia Flyers. Show all posts
Monday, January 07, 2008
Now the Flyers are even becoming a danger to themselves…
Perhaps now the Philadelphia Flyers management will try to reign in some of their over exuberant employees. Saturday night’s session with the Toronto Maple Leafs found the Flyers moving their punishing play from the opposition to their own members.
Sami Kapanen had to leave the ice after suffering lip lacerations that required 25 stitches, that after he was struck with a puck on an attempted pass from team mate Mike Richards, even with the emergency stitching Kapenen must be considering himself lucky considering what happened to fellow Flyer Joffrey Lupul.
In the midst of what turned out to be a rather nasty little game at the Air Canada Centre Saturday, the Flyers Derian Hatcher launched himself at the Leafs Alex Steen, sending out what would have been a crushing body check if only Steen hadn’t of ducked, Steen who may or may not have seen his life flash in front of his eyes took more of a glancing blow rather than the full executioners crunch from Hatcher, who instead piled into team mate Joffrey Lupul.
Steen managed to skate away more or less unscathed from the experience, but the same can’t be said for Lupul. After examination on Sunday the Flyers announced that the Flyers winger would be lost indefinitely, possibly even for a number of months. Lupul will now sit on the injured list suffering from a spinal contusion and a concussion, the net sum of Hatcher’s attempt to slow down the Swede.
Friday night Hatcher made news when he allegedly bit the glove hand of the New Jersey Devils' Travis Zajac. According to the NHL the video shows that Zajac put his glove in Hatcher's mouth during a scrum, which then caught on one of Hatcher's incisors, cutting his middle finger. Suggesting that Hatcher was not the aggressor in the matter, the league did not provide any discipline for the incident.
While Lupul was clearing the cobwebs on Sunday and Hatcher perhaps brushing his team, their team mate Steve Downie was once again preparing for the latest announcement about him from NHL Chief Justice Colin Campbell. The encore performance by the league office came about after Downie sucker punched the Leafs Jason Blake during a skirmish on Saturday night. During the third period incident, Blake was being held by a linesman after yet another altercation, when Downie reached around and clocked him just under the right eye.
Blake was kept off the ice for the rest of the game Saturday as a precaution and while looking like something that might come out of Dr. Frankenstein’s lab, he did not suffer any major injuries from the punch that certainly fell outside of the Marquis of Queensbury rules. Downie was assessed a double minor for the infraction, a pair of penalties that didn’t sit well with the Leafs who were suggesting that a stronger punishment was required.
In his announcement on Monday Colin Campbell would however no doubt bring disappointment to the Leafs, Downie was not punished further by the league for his punch, but was told by Campbell that he’s now to be considered “on thin ice”.
A statement that does tend to make you wonder just what it is that Downie will have to do before the NHL tires of him and bids him a farewell. Flyers GM Paul Holmgren, who spends a fair amount of his time now trying to quell the talk of a team full of goons, says that his discussion with Downie afterwards was even harsher than Campbell’s. Though there apparently will be no action on the part of the Flyers either, short of maybe or changing the pre game diet which we suspect must include some kind of raw meat products.
Downie while suggesting that he did receive Holmgren's message, then turned around and more or less blamed the Toronto media for making a bigger deal out of it all than it was really well, so much for his act of contrition we guess.
And while Holmgren tries to impress upon Downie of the need to play a little smarter, what we would really like to know is what Holmgren might have said to Hatcher, after all taking a mid game snack on Friday is one thing, but once you start knocking your own players out of the line up, perhaps you’re playing the game with just a little too much of an edge.
All in all, Saturday sure provided a pretty good example for the Flyers that perhaps that old Broad Street bullies image that they claim they're not trying to cultivate, is still lingering around the dressing room. Heck, we didn't even get to examine the thoughts of the once again injured Carlo Colaiacovo, who swears that the knee on knee collision with Jim Dowd may have been a dirty hit.
Ah, you just have to think that somewhere in the fibre of those fancy new Rbk Flyer unis rests the spirited old hockey DNA of Bob "Mad Dog" Kelly and Dave "The Hammer" Schultz.
Though, to be fair to the old guard of the seventies, to our memory they never actually took out the players on their own roster, content to keep the hostilities confined to the guys in the other sweaters.
Philadelphia Inquirer--Lupul out indefinitely with bruised spinal cord
Philadelphia Inquirer--Flyers win but lose two players
Philadelphia Inquirer--Flyers' bite worse than their bark
Philadelphia Inquirer--Downie won't be suspended for sucker punch
Philadelphia News--Lupul to be out a while
National Post--League investigating sucker-punch on Blake
National Post--Downie avoids suspension
Toronto Star--Colaiacovo believes Dowd targeted him
Toronto Star--Leafs agony of defeat continues
Toronto Star--Leafs fall to Flyers
Toronto Sun--Maple Leafs are both nicked and ticked
Globe and Mail--Leafs pepper Flyers with shots but come up short on scoreboard
Globe and Mail--Downie avoids suspension for sucker punch
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
In Philadelphia, another injurred player is taken off the ice
The bad blood between the Bruins and Flyers apparently won't be ending anytime soon, this after yet another dangerous hit resulted in yet another Boston player to be helped from the ice, not to return to action on Monday night.
At 14:22 of the second period, the Flyers Scott Hartnell elbowed the Bruins Andrew Alberts into the boards near centre ice, a location where Alberts would lay on the ice for minutes before being eventually lifted to his feet and escorted to the locker room for evaluation.
As a result of the elbowing incident, Hartnell was assessed a boarding major and a game misconduct.
It's the latest in high profile incidents involving the Flyers, the second one of which has claimed a Bruin in less than a month. The Bruins Patrice Bergeron was hammered to the boards face-first by Flyers defenceman Randy Jones and suffered a concussion at the time, he has yet to return to action and there is some fear that his problems may be long lasting and potentially career ending.
The Flyers made news at the start of the season after successive incidents in Ottawa and Vancouver, which resulted in lengthy suspensions.
The latest incident on Monday night will once again raise questions about the style of play of the Flyers and whether further sanctions may be required against management over the frequently controversial incidents.
.
The Philadelphia Inquirer posted a quote from Colin Campbell providing a terse no comment as his reply to any further potential action against the Flyers. Asked last night whether the league will consider addressing a pattern to the Flyers' violence, Colin Campbell, the NHL's director of hockey operations and league disciplinarian, replied: "No comment."
Canadian Press--Alberts leaves game after another dangerous Flyers hit
Associated Press--Murray has two goals, Savard adds goal and three assists in Bruins' 6-3 victory over Flyers
Philly.com--Flyers lose, and may face penalty
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Three strikes and you’re out for Philly?
Paging Sheriff Campbell!
The Philadelphia Flyers once again find themselves in the hot seat, after yet another ugly on ice incident.
Saturday night in Boston, the Flyers Randy Jones crushed Boston’s Patrice Bergeron from behind into the boards in the Flyers end of the rink. Bergeron lay prone on the ice for several minutes following the hit, while yet another series of scuffles broke out in a game that had already become a chippy affair.
The careless and dangerous hit on Bergeron marks the third time that a Flyer player has sent someone to the hospital in less than two months. It marks a trend that has many beginning to wonder if the Flyers are out of control and whether the discipline phase needs to go beyond the players on the ice.
Clearly the message about respect for players is not being received in Philadelphia, where the line between physical hockey and physical assault seems to get blurred from time to time.
Last nights hit by Jones isn’t as spectacular at the previous two examples of violent hockey, but it could have been just as, if not more dangerous as Bergeron was completely unprotected from the jarring smash into the boards.
.
At full speed it isn’t as obvious as the Steve Downie hit on Ottawa's Dean McCammond , or as violent looking as the cross check by Jesse Boulerice on Vancouver’s Ryan Kessler. But watch it a few times and you realize that the vulnerability of Bergeron on the boards at that time could have resulted in much more than just the overnight stay for observation that he endured.
While the game has always been on of physical contact, the Flyers seem to be on a march to recreate the boundaries for contact in the game not seen since the infamous seventies.
The NHL has so far this season twice sent Philadelphia a message that the kind of play they are engaging in is not acceptable, suspensions to the responsible players were supposed to set the tone for the rest of the year that violent and stupid incidents would not be tolerated.
Now once again, the NHL must sit down and examine yet another violent Flyer miscue, the time may be at hand to make the organization as accountable as its players, for what seems to be a mindset that has developed this season.
For their part the Flyers issued the obligatory comments that they are glad that Bergeron is ok and that Jones is anything but the prototype of the dirty player. They provided their interpretation of the nights events that the hit was not dirty, that Bergeron had come up short on the boards and left himself vulnerable. While the evidence does seem to support their claim that he's not a dirty player, he was regardless careless in this instance and made the wrong decision in the heat of the moment, a common trait of late it seems.
It must be maddening to watch a Flyers game from the NHL war room, never sure when a stupid play is going to be the next day’s talking point for hockey fans. Maybe Colin Campbell needs to talk slower, show more pictures and bring in a huge chalkboard for the Flyers to write “we will not (insert latest violent act) anymore.”
.
Maybe the time has come to suspend the coach as well as the player, fine the organization or make the Flyers top scorer sit out as well, for as long as the offender is suspended and the victim recovers. Maybe they should just send the entire organization to a taping of Dr. Phil, so as to address their anti social behavior!
Clearly the solutions thus far haven't had the desired impact in Philadelphia, the league needs to do whatever it takes to get the message across to the Flyers that their style of play is starting to cause the game embarrassment.
There may be a love of physical hockey by the fans, but the prospect of player after player lying in a hospital room waiting to recover from the latest on ice assault is something that will eventually attract the attention of the courts.
If hockey can’t control the sudden surge in violence that seems to flow out of a visit from the Flyers, somebody else will, and that will be far more detrimental to the game than the prospect of alienating those that aren’t happy until the stretcher comes out on the ice.
The Philadelphia Flyers once again find themselves in the hot seat, after yet another ugly on ice incident.
Saturday night in Boston, the Flyers Randy Jones crushed Boston’s Patrice Bergeron from behind into the boards in the Flyers end of the rink. Bergeron lay prone on the ice for several minutes following the hit, while yet another series of scuffles broke out in a game that had already become a chippy affair.
The careless and dangerous hit on Bergeron marks the third time that a Flyer player has sent someone to the hospital in less than two months. It marks a trend that has many beginning to wonder if the Flyers are out of control and whether the discipline phase needs to go beyond the players on the ice.
Clearly the message about respect for players is not being received in Philadelphia, where the line between physical hockey and physical assault seems to get blurred from time to time.
Last nights hit by Jones isn’t as spectacular at the previous two examples of violent hockey, but it could have been just as, if not more dangerous as Bergeron was completely unprotected from the jarring smash into the boards.
.
At full speed it isn’t as obvious as the Steve Downie hit on Ottawa's Dean McCammond , or as violent looking as the cross check by Jesse Boulerice on Vancouver’s Ryan Kessler. But watch it a few times and you realize that the vulnerability of Bergeron on the boards at that time could have resulted in much more than just the overnight stay for observation that he endured.
While the game has always been on of physical contact, the Flyers seem to be on a march to recreate the boundaries for contact in the game not seen since the infamous seventies.
The NHL has so far this season twice sent Philadelphia a message that the kind of play they are engaging in is not acceptable, suspensions to the responsible players were supposed to set the tone for the rest of the year that violent and stupid incidents would not be tolerated.
Now once again, the NHL must sit down and examine yet another violent Flyer miscue, the time may be at hand to make the organization as accountable as its players, for what seems to be a mindset that has developed this season.
For their part the Flyers issued the obligatory comments that they are glad that Bergeron is ok and that Jones is anything but the prototype of the dirty player. They provided their interpretation of the nights events that the hit was not dirty, that Bergeron had come up short on the boards and left himself vulnerable. While the evidence does seem to support their claim that he's not a dirty player, he was regardless careless in this instance and made the wrong decision in the heat of the moment, a common trait of late it seems.
It must be maddening to watch a Flyers game from the NHL war room, never sure when a stupid play is going to be the next day’s talking point for hockey fans. Maybe Colin Campbell needs to talk slower, show more pictures and bring in a huge chalkboard for the Flyers to write “we will not (insert latest violent act) anymore.”
.
Maybe the time has come to suspend the coach as well as the player, fine the organization or make the Flyers top scorer sit out as well, for as long as the offender is suspended and the victim recovers. Maybe they should just send the entire organization to a taping of Dr. Phil, so as to address their anti social behavior!
Clearly the solutions thus far haven't had the desired impact in Philadelphia, the league needs to do whatever it takes to get the message across to the Flyers that their style of play is starting to cause the game embarrassment.
There may be a love of physical hockey by the fans, but the prospect of player after player lying in a hospital room waiting to recover from the latest on ice assault is something that will eventually attract the attention of the courts.
If hockey can’t control the sudden surge in violence that seems to flow out of a visit from the Flyers, somebody else will, and that will be far more detrimental to the game than the prospect of alienating those that aren’t happy until the stretcher comes out on the ice.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Reviving the days of the Bullies?
Two ugly incidents in less than a month involving the Philadelphia Flyers have many hockey fans wondering if the era of the Broad Street Bullies has returned to the NHL.
Not since Schultz, Kelly, Dupont et al brought terror to NHL rinks on a nightly basis, have the Philadelphia Flyers found themselves the focus of so much attention.
Over the off season the Flyers proclaimed that they were returning to the values that made Flyer hockey famous; tough, physical play and a pre season of fight filled games seemed to testify to the change of direction in Flyer hockey from recent years.
Gone it seems will be the free wheeling, skating game that the NHL promised after the lock out year came to an end. Anaheim marched, hit and fought their way to a Stanley Cup last year and this year’s version of the Philadelphia Legions seems determined to return to the era of intimidation and cheap shots.
Colin Campbell, Chief Justice of the NHL Supreme Court may want to keep Friday’s open for Flyers, (Flyer Friday's has a nice ring to it doesn't it?) as he once again finds the e mail clogged with missives about seemingly out of control hockey players decorated in orange and black
On September 20th Campbell had to deal with the horrifying to watch hit of Steve Downie on Ottawa’s Dean McCammond, as Downie became a human missile and literally launched himself into the air and took out McCammond in an explosion of violence.
McCammond lay on the ice without movement for far too many minutes and to this day has not returned to the line up for the Senators and is not expected back for the next two to three weeks at the earliest.
For his transgression of not only civil behavior but common sense, Downie has found himself suspended for twenty games, a punishment that many have deemed as too short considering the nature of his brutal hit on McCammond.
So, if twenty games is not considered a strong enough deterrent for this kind of unwanted behavior in the game, whatever is Campbell to do with Jesse Boulerice, who on Wednesday night provided a sickening cross check to Ryan Kessler's face, dropping the Canuck forward to the ice in a heap.
It was a particularly ugly aspect to what had become a very ugly game, the Flyers running ahead on the scoreboard and both teams running around the ice, taking shots at forwards, defencemen and a goaltender before the cage match came to an end.
Boulerice has the unique entry on his resume of being banned by the OHL for an entire season, after a nasty episode in his junior days, which found him in trouble with the law when he was charged with assault to do great bodily harm less than murder after hitting Andrew Long of the Guelph Storm during the OHL final in 1998.
So far this season he has been busying himself by racking up the majors at a pretty good clip and portraying the role of Vlad the Impaler for the Flyers, just look up his name in a YouTube search engine and you'll quickly learn that Jesse ain't in the line up for his scoring touch .
The calls for swift and definitive justice have come from across the NHL. A 20 games suspension is the apparent benchmark, but no one it seems would have a problem if Justice Campbell were to double that punishment, in order to set an example and highlight the fact that the senseless violence of the last few weeks has to end now.
Hockey has always been a tough and at times violent game. The bone crushing checks, nasty stick work and even full scale brawls have long been documented in past eras, as an aspect of the game that while unseemly were accepted as part of the sport.
As the NHL entered the new era of enlightenment of the last four or five years the attempt was made to try to reign in the wild marauders, in order to allow the artistic play makers some room to operate. The last couple of seasons however have seen the more physical part of the game begin to regain more and more of a foothold in the sport, now the physical nature has given way to the blatantly violent.
While the body checks are welcome, the stick work and disrespect of fellow players must be exorcised from the play. The NHL has been lucky so far, no one has been seriously injured or God forbid killed by one of these senseless acts of stupidity, but you have to think that the odds against that get slimmer with each violent act on the ice.
The Flyers may like to reminisce about the Good old days when the toughest of the tough could lay waste to team after team in quest of the Stanley Cup. But for the future of the sport, the time is now to get some control over the madder dogs from all teams that are patrolling the ice. It's hard to believe that the Flyers and the other teams, didn't get the message that the goonery was no longer acceptable back in September, the Boulerice incident should be the last time a message needs to be sent.
The league office needs to reclaim the ice, making it clear to all teams that the lack of respect being shown by players to their competitors must end. The ugly head shots of the last month have no place in hockey, Colin Campbell and Gary Bettman must make that stand and do it now, if for no other reason than the fact that if they don’t, there are surely any number of politicians or law enforcement agencies that will be more than ready to step in and take charge.
Hockey is getting back into the mainstream spotlight, but once again it’s not for amazing goals or talented personalities. Instead, the media glare is focusing on brutal assaults that on any Canadian or American city street would probably have the offender spending time in a prison.
The time is now to send a strong message that the sudden violent turn that the game has taken has no place in the NHL of today, if they miss this opportunity then once again the NHL will have only itself to blame for the troubles that will surely follow.
Not since Schultz, Kelly, Dupont et al brought terror to NHL rinks on a nightly basis, have the Philadelphia Flyers found themselves the focus of so much attention.
Over the off season the Flyers proclaimed that they were returning to the values that made Flyer hockey famous; tough, physical play and a pre season of fight filled games seemed to testify to the change of direction in Flyer hockey from recent years.
Gone it seems will be the free wheeling, skating game that the NHL promised after the lock out year came to an end. Anaheim marched, hit and fought their way to a Stanley Cup last year and this year’s version of the Philadelphia Legions seems determined to return to the era of intimidation and cheap shots.
Colin Campbell, Chief Justice of the NHL Supreme Court may want to keep Friday’s open for Flyers, (Flyer Friday's has a nice ring to it doesn't it?) as he once again finds the e mail clogged with missives about seemingly out of control hockey players decorated in orange and black
On September 20th Campbell had to deal with the horrifying to watch hit of Steve Downie on Ottawa’s Dean McCammond, as Downie became a human missile and literally launched himself into the air and took out McCammond in an explosion of violence.
McCammond lay on the ice without movement for far too many minutes and to this day has not returned to the line up for the Senators and is not expected back for the next two to three weeks at the earliest.
For his transgression of not only civil behavior but common sense, Downie has found himself suspended for twenty games, a punishment that many have deemed as too short considering the nature of his brutal hit on McCammond.
So, if twenty games is not considered a strong enough deterrent for this kind of unwanted behavior in the game, whatever is Campbell to do with Jesse Boulerice, who on Wednesday night provided a sickening cross check to Ryan Kessler's face, dropping the Canuck forward to the ice in a heap.
It was a particularly ugly aspect to what had become a very ugly game, the Flyers running ahead on the scoreboard and both teams running around the ice, taking shots at forwards, defencemen and a goaltender before the cage match came to an end.
Boulerice has the unique entry on his resume of being banned by the OHL for an entire season, after a nasty episode in his junior days, which found him in trouble with the law when he was charged with assault to do great bodily harm less than murder after hitting Andrew Long of the Guelph Storm during the OHL final in 1998.
So far this season he has been busying himself by racking up the majors at a pretty good clip and portraying the role of Vlad the Impaler for the Flyers, just look up his name in a YouTube search engine and you'll quickly learn that Jesse ain't in the line up for his scoring touch .
The calls for swift and definitive justice have come from across the NHL. A 20 games suspension is the apparent benchmark, but no one it seems would have a problem if Justice Campbell were to double that punishment, in order to set an example and highlight the fact that the senseless violence of the last few weeks has to end now.
Hockey has always been a tough and at times violent game. The bone crushing checks, nasty stick work and even full scale brawls have long been documented in past eras, as an aspect of the game that while unseemly were accepted as part of the sport.
As the NHL entered the new era of enlightenment of the last four or five years the attempt was made to try to reign in the wild marauders, in order to allow the artistic play makers some room to operate. The last couple of seasons however have seen the more physical part of the game begin to regain more and more of a foothold in the sport, now the physical nature has given way to the blatantly violent.
While the body checks are welcome, the stick work and disrespect of fellow players must be exorcised from the play. The NHL has been lucky so far, no one has been seriously injured or God forbid killed by one of these senseless acts of stupidity, but you have to think that the odds against that get slimmer with each violent act on the ice.
The Flyers may like to reminisce about the Good old days when the toughest of the tough could lay waste to team after team in quest of the Stanley Cup. But for the future of the sport, the time is now to get some control over the madder dogs from all teams that are patrolling the ice. It's hard to believe that the Flyers and the other teams, didn't get the message that the goonery was no longer acceptable back in September, the Boulerice incident should be the last time a message needs to be sent.
The league office needs to reclaim the ice, making it clear to all teams that the lack of respect being shown by players to their competitors must end. The ugly head shots of the last month have no place in hockey, Colin Campbell and Gary Bettman must make that stand and do it now, if for no other reason than the fact that if they don’t, there are surely any number of politicians or law enforcement agencies that will be more than ready to step in and take charge.
Hockey is getting back into the mainstream spotlight, but once again it’s not for amazing goals or talented personalities. Instead, the media glare is focusing on brutal assaults that on any Canadian or American city street would probably have the offender spending time in a prison.
The time is now to send a strong message that the sudden violent turn that the game has taken has no place in the NHL of today, if they miss this opportunity then once again the NHL will have only itself to blame for the troubles that will surely follow.
Monday, October 01, 2007
From the NHL catwalk: Flyers
As the NHL and Rbk release the new updated uniforms for the NHL this year, we'll provide a link to the NHL shop page and a preview of the new look.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Holmgren gets a rock!
It’s a nice trick or treat kind of night for Paul Holmgren, the current interim Flyer GM discovers that the boss Ed Snider, has approached a league official to take over the duties of rebuilding the Flyer brand in Philly.
Holmgren claims he knows nothing of the offer to Colin Campbell by Snider to pick up where Bobby Clarke left off and right the listing Flyer squad and turn around the fortunes of the former monster of the East. The first news of the supposed job offer came from Sportsnet on Tuesday night, citing sources in Philadelphia who apparently have the ear of the Flyer’s president.
"I have no idea about that," Holmgren told The Canadian Press Tuesday.
This is not a good sign for the one chosen by Clarke, to try to move the Flyers back to their dominant position in the NHL. The Flyers Boss man didn’t even provide the obligatory “vote of confidence” in Holmgren, which is normally how a GM or coach knows that his days might be numbered. The sorry state of the Flyers so far this year is the kind of thing that attracts attention, and with each passing day the situation becomes dire for anyone with any control over the direction of the team.
While Holmgren tries to read the tea leaves in the Flyer offices, Campbell has to make a decision of his own. Does he want to leave his executive office in the NHL head office, (and rumours that he would like to be a GM have been floating around for months now) and if so does he really want to take on the task of taking the challenge of the Flyers on.
The upsides are obvious, Philadelphia has got to be one of the more desirable of franchises to try and make your own. The city is a hotbed of sports from the Eagles, the Sixers and the Phillies, the Flyers have always been in the thick of things, a symbol of a tough scrappy city that doesn't like to lose. The Flyers have a fair amount of history of their own in the city , they have faithful fans and they’ve had the will to win in the past. Return them to glory and the town could be yours.
The downsides: Fail and well, the swamps of New Jersey aren’t too far away!!
It will be interesting to see how this develops over the next few days, already the impression has been set that Holmgren now is a lame duck GM, just biding his time until Snider finds who he really wants at the helm.
If Campbell turns down the Flyers, then one wonders how fast Snider will go to a plan B, with the word out that he’s looking, Holmgren may wish to get his resume updated, he may be looking himself as well.
Holmgren claims he knows nothing of the offer to Colin Campbell by Snider to pick up where Bobby Clarke left off and right the listing Flyer squad and turn around the fortunes of the former monster of the East. The first news of the supposed job offer came from Sportsnet on Tuesday night, citing sources in Philadelphia who apparently have the ear of the Flyer’s president.
"I have no idea about that," Holmgren told The Canadian Press Tuesday.
This is not a good sign for the one chosen by Clarke, to try to move the Flyers back to their dominant position in the NHL. The Flyers Boss man didn’t even provide the obligatory “vote of confidence” in Holmgren, which is normally how a GM or coach knows that his days might be numbered. The sorry state of the Flyers so far this year is the kind of thing that attracts attention, and with each passing day the situation becomes dire for anyone with any control over the direction of the team.
While Holmgren tries to read the tea leaves in the Flyer offices, Campbell has to make a decision of his own. Does he want to leave his executive office in the NHL head office, (and rumours that he would like to be a GM have been floating around for months now) and if so does he really want to take on the task of taking the challenge of the Flyers on.
The upsides are obvious, Philadelphia has got to be one of the more desirable of franchises to try and make your own. The city is a hotbed of sports from the Eagles, the Sixers and the Phillies, the Flyers have always been in the thick of things, a symbol of a tough scrappy city that doesn't like to lose. The Flyers have a fair amount of history of their own in the city , they have faithful fans and they’ve had the will to win in the past. Return them to glory and the town could be yours.
The downsides: Fail and well, the swamps of New Jersey aren’t too far away!!
It will be interesting to see how this develops over the next few days, already the impression has been set that Holmgren now is a lame duck GM, just biding his time until Snider finds who he really wants at the helm.
If Campbell turns down the Flyers, then one wonders how fast Snider will go to a plan B, with the word out that he’s looking, Holmgren may wish to get his resume updated, he may be looking himself as well.
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Philadelphia Freedom
One was burned out, the other tossed out. Regardless of the procedure involved, there are changes in Philadelphia and a new chapter is set to begin in the history of one of the most dominant of franchises of the modern era.
Bob Clarke called it quits explaining that he had lost interest in his job as far back as last season, the 19 year veteran GM suggested that he felt he had done a poor job of managing the team since that point, making today’s decision a necessity.
Clarke painted a picture of an almost burnt out resident of the Flyers office, in which he deferred almost all decisions to his assistant Paul HolmgrenA at the end of the day Clarke felt that Ed Snider and the organization required something more than a pass the buck GM. And so Clarke took his walk away on Sunday morning, in effect firing himself.
What’s alarming for Flyer fans is the fact that the signs of this were being recognized last year and yet the Flyers fell into the trap of ignoring the evidence at time, leading up to the mess they find themselves in today.
With Clarke’s departure, the head of Coach Ken Hitchcock was provided to at least offer something to the Flyers fans who have seen the team get off to its worst start since the 1989-90 season. With a record of 1-6-1 so far in the year, comments rumbled around the league that Hitchcock had lost the confidence of his team, the players having tuned him out seemed to be lost on the ice, making mistakes that you wouldn’t see of the most woeful of house league teams.
The question though must be did Hitchcock really lose the ability to coach at team in such a short period of time, or were the Flyers a little too quick to tie the can to his backside.
By Clarke’s own admission he had lost interest in his team last year, so that means an entire off season and the first month of this season featured a team with no discernible leadership. It was a situation that was hardly the responsibility of a head coach and surely not one that would help him in preparing a team for the upcoming season.
Only Clarke and Hitchcock know for sure how dysfunctional things became in Philadelphia in the last six months or so, but it’s a bit too easy to give the roster a pass on the responsibility slope. Likewise, the ownership needs to look at their handling of things in the last few years as well.
Whether the GM had a wandering mind or the coach overlooked a few things, that doesn’t excuse a defence that showed no interest in clearing the zone, or an offense that had troubles negotiating a proper onside play let alone mount and offensive zone attack. If the GM was bringing in the wrong type of players for a faster paced league, surely somebody up in the private boxes must have noticed that the team was having a problem keeping pace.
Bob Clarke called it quits explaining that he had lost interest in his job as far back as last season, the 19 year veteran GM suggested that he felt he had done a poor job of managing the team since that point, making today’s decision a necessity.
Clarke painted a picture of an almost burnt out resident of the Flyers office, in which he deferred almost all decisions to his assistant Paul HolmgrenA at the end of the day Clarke felt that Ed Snider and the organization required something more than a pass the buck GM. And so Clarke took his walk away on Sunday morning, in effect firing himself.
What’s alarming for Flyer fans is the fact that the signs of this were being recognized last year and yet the Flyers fell into the trap of ignoring the evidence at time, leading up to the mess they find themselves in today.
With Clarke’s departure, the head of Coach Ken Hitchcock was provided to at least offer something to the Flyers fans who have seen the team get off to its worst start since the 1989-90 season. With a record of 1-6-1 so far in the year, comments rumbled around the league that Hitchcock had lost the confidence of his team, the players having tuned him out seemed to be lost on the ice, making mistakes that you wouldn’t see of the most woeful of house league teams.
The question though must be did Hitchcock really lose the ability to coach at team in such a short period of time, or were the Flyers a little too quick to tie the can to his backside.
By Clarke’s own admission he had lost interest in his team last year, so that means an entire off season and the first month of this season featured a team with no discernible leadership. It was a situation that was hardly the responsibility of a head coach and surely not one that would help him in preparing a team for the upcoming season.
Only Clarke and Hitchcock know for sure how dysfunctional things became in Philadelphia in the last six months or so, but it’s a bit too easy to give the roster a pass on the responsibility slope. Likewise, the ownership needs to look at their handling of things in the last few years as well.
Whether the GM had a wandering mind or the coach overlooked a few things, that doesn’t excuse a defence that showed no interest in clearing the zone, or an offense that had troubles negotiating a proper onside play let alone mount and offensive zone attack. If the GM was bringing in the wrong type of players for a faster paced league, surely somebody up in the private boxes must have noticed that the team was having a problem keeping pace.
None of that will change overnight under the stewardship of the interim GM Holmgren or the new face behind the bench in the form of John Stevens an assistant coach, who previously coached the farm club Phantoms to the AHL championship.
They will look over a line up that has been underperforming rather dramatically in this early season. This quote from Ed Snider suggests that player changes may not be on the way anytime soon: “We have a lot better talent on the team than we've shown so far.”
And while Snider may think that’s true, it’s certainly open to debate after the first eight games of the season. If Holmgren and Stevens have any hopes of moving from interim to permanent, they had best hope that the “better talent” gets a lot better pretty fast.
It’s always easiest to fire the coach; it’s not always the right thing. Accountability begins on the rink and this year the Flyers in all departments have deferred on that requirement.
It may have indeed been time for Clarke to leave, nineteen years is a long time to run a hockey team, especially in a league that seems to redefine itself every five years or so. And frankly there won’t be many that are terribly upset that he’s become the architect of his own demise.
Likewise perhaps Hitchcock had over stayed his welcome in Philadelphia, coaching in the NHL seems to be a vocation that demands results fast.
But if the ownership group wants to see a way out of their current predicament, looking in the mirror might help. As Alan Adams says at Sports on Fox, Snider took his eye of the team over the last few years, making the decision today an insulator over poor upper managment.
Today’s announcement was the first major bloodletting of the season, a surprising development for many observers in Philly. With a few other teams struggling out of the gate, it will be interesting to see if the Flyers are once again the trendsetters or the just an anomaly in the new NHL.
Friday, October 20, 2006
No Fly Zone in Philly
The season is but only a few weeks old and already there are rumblings that all is not well in the City of Brotherly love. TSN spent a good portion of its telecast of the Flyers and Lightning game on Thursday night, wondering aloud for the future of Flyers coach Ken Hitchcock.
With Philadelphia off to a horrid start and something seemingly missing on the ice, the first casualty of the coaching fraternity this season may be the guy behind the Flyers bench.
The Flyers have played of late like a team that has tuned out their coach, the embarrassment of the slaughter to Buffalo of a few nights ago, a punctuation mark on a desperate situation. The best indication of the troubles in Philly could be the situation involving Hitchcock and his goaltender Robert Esche. Esche had openly complained about playing time and his icy relationship with his coach, finally given a chance to show his stuff, Esche was greeted to the Armageddon of shots and goals dirceted by the Sabres this week. When it came time to walk the walk, Esche balked, assisted ably by a team that simply walked!
Speaking of talking, Mike Richards delivered a blistering examination of the play of himself and his fellow team mates and no one could quibble with his comments, in fact he may be the clearest thinker on the team these days.
Featuring a hands on owner who doesn’t like to lose, the current crop of Flyers are tempting fate by losing in most spectacular ways. Year in and year out the Flyers are selected as one of the top echelon teams, yet in recent years that normally translates into a playoff exit and a promise to find the missing ingredients to build a winner.
Judging by the results of the early part of the season, they must have lost a recipe book or two in the off season. With one win to show for seven games, the questions are starting to pile up. The Flyers do not seem to play with a purpose, nor any chemistry, a collection of players merely skating up and down the ice, involvement in the play an option, scoring goals not a priority and as the debacle against Buffalo proved stopping goals ain’t too high on the list either.
All of this points to change and in a city that prefers winners to losers, change had better come quick. With an owner who is less than impressed the time is quickly ticking out for any kind of quick turn around of fortunes.
The first move of the desperate was the demotion of three players to the Philadelphia Phantoms line up, including the always enigmatic Petr Nedved. All three cleared waivers before moving to the farm team across the road, nary an indication of interest from the 29 other members of the NHL lodge.
Perhaps the fact that Bob Clarke did not endear himself to his fellow GM’s in the off season will come back to haunt him. Rather than throw the combative GM a life line by way of trade, many will watch with amusement as he thrashes about in the shark infested waters of the NHL.
The Flyers lost to the Lightning on Thursday, a game that many said could determine what has to be done by Snider, Clarke and Hitchcock (if he’s still part of the big picture). Most observers say that they played a with a bit more interest than the game against Buffalo provided, but once again they faded badly when they fell behind. A worrisome trend that isn’t something normally associated with Flyer teams.
However, their first concern must be the status of captain Peter Forsberg injured during the game with a wrist injury. They will have a better idea of his situation on Friday after some tests are done.
Once they check out Forsberg’s wrist perhaps they could order up some cardiac evaluations, the Flyers don’t show much of a heart these days. It might be time to see if perhaps it’s time for some transplants.
With Philadelphia off to a horrid start and something seemingly missing on the ice, the first casualty of the coaching fraternity this season may be the guy behind the Flyers bench.
The Flyers have played of late like a team that has tuned out their coach, the embarrassment of the slaughter to Buffalo of a few nights ago, a punctuation mark on a desperate situation. The best indication of the troubles in Philly could be the situation involving Hitchcock and his goaltender Robert Esche. Esche had openly complained about playing time and his icy relationship with his coach, finally given a chance to show his stuff, Esche was greeted to the Armageddon of shots and goals dirceted by the Sabres this week. When it came time to walk the walk, Esche balked, assisted ably by a team that simply walked!
Speaking of talking, Mike Richards delivered a blistering examination of the play of himself and his fellow team mates and no one could quibble with his comments, in fact he may be the clearest thinker on the team these days.
Featuring a hands on owner who doesn’t like to lose, the current crop of Flyers are tempting fate by losing in most spectacular ways. Year in and year out the Flyers are selected as one of the top echelon teams, yet in recent years that normally translates into a playoff exit and a promise to find the missing ingredients to build a winner.
Judging by the results of the early part of the season, they must have lost a recipe book or two in the off season. With one win to show for seven games, the questions are starting to pile up. The Flyers do not seem to play with a purpose, nor any chemistry, a collection of players merely skating up and down the ice, involvement in the play an option, scoring goals not a priority and as the debacle against Buffalo proved stopping goals ain’t too high on the list either.
All of this points to change and in a city that prefers winners to losers, change had better come quick. With an owner who is less than impressed the time is quickly ticking out for any kind of quick turn around of fortunes.
The first move of the desperate was the demotion of three players to the Philadelphia Phantoms line up, including the always enigmatic Petr Nedved. All three cleared waivers before moving to the farm team across the road, nary an indication of interest from the 29 other members of the NHL lodge.
Perhaps the fact that Bob Clarke did not endear himself to his fellow GM’s in the off season will come back to haunt him. Rather than throw the combative GM a life line by way of trade, many will watch with amusement as he thrashes about in the shark infested waters of the NHL.
The Flyers lost to the Lightning on Thursday, a game that many said could determine what has to be done by Snider, Clarke and Hitchcock (if he’s still part of the big picture). Most observers say that they played a with a bit more interest than the game against Buffalo provided, but once again they faded badly when they fell behind. A worrisome trend that isn’t something normally associated with Flyer teams.
However, their first concern must be the status of captain Peter Forsberg injured during the game with a wrist injury. They will have a better idea of his situation on Friday after some tests are done.
Once they check out Forsberg’s wrist perhaps they could order up some cardiac evaluations, the Flyers don’t show much of a heart these days. It might be time to see if perhaps it’s time for some transplants.
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