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Meltzer's Musings: 9 -2 -10 |
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Until recently, the defense position has not been regarded as a particular strength of the Flyers’ clubs of the last decade. The perception has often been that the top three or four are decent but the team has lacked solid depth. Even so, there is actually a pretty good field of contenders of defenseman of the decade honors, and a tough choice for the second-team selection if one is to choose only a single player (rather than a “defense pairing”) for first and second-team honors.
Without question, Chris Pronger is the biggest impact defenseman the club has had since Mark Howe. But it’s tough to justify selecting him for the top or second spot for all-decade honors when he only plated the final season of the 1999-2000 to 2009-10 time period with the team.
FIRST TEAM: Eric Desjardins
There is little doubt that Desjardins was the top Flyers’ defenseman of the 1990s, but it’s a much tougher call to rate him against the other worthy candidates of the last 10 years. The Desjardins of the 2000s was a different player than he was in the first few years after he came over from Montreal. In his 30s, after suffering knee injuries, he lost a full stride and no longer boasted nearly the same mobility. It took a “Rico” a little time to readjust his game, but after a tough 2000-01 season defensively, he once again established himself as a fine two-way defenseman until frequent injuries caused him to miss more and more time and Kim Johnsson became the club’s top blueliner for a few seasons.
Even as he slowly had to remake his defensive game, Desjardins remained an above-average offensive defenseman. He registered 14-goal, 55-point and 15-goal, 48-campaigns for the first two seasons of the ranking period. The first mark remains the single-season high-water production level for a Flyers defenseman in the last decade, although Chris Pronger also had a 55 point season (10 G, 45 A) last season.
SECOND TEAM: Kimmo Timonen
In my opinion, compelling arguments could be made on behalf of Timonen or Kim Johnsson as well as Desjardins for the Flyers top defenseman of the last decade. Since coming over from Nashville, Timonen has been everything the Flyers had hoped he’d be: competitive, solid both offensively and defensively, able to eat up a lot of tough minutes on the ice and resilient. A class act on and off the ice, Timonen’s value to the club has always gone beyond his stats. I gave him the slight nod over Johnsson because Kimmo has been more of a take-charge player than Johnsson was even in his best years with the club.
HONORABLE MENTION: Kim Johnsson, Chris Pronger, Derian Hatcher.
The play of Kim Johnsson was the best thing the Flyers got out of the Eric Lindros trade. From 2001-02 to 2003-04, Johnsson steadily took over the mantle of the team’s best defenseman from Eric Desjardins, and only missed two regular season games in the process. Unfortunately, he got banged up in the playoffs a couple times, and wasn’t quite as effective.
If a salary cap hadn’t been installed after the 2004-05 lockout, Johnsson’s Flyers tenure would likely have been several seasons longer. Instead, he signed a one-year extension, went through an injury-marred (most notably concussion-prone) campaign in 2005-06 that limited him to 47 games and kept him out of the playoffs. He signed a big-bucks, long-term UFA contract with Minnesota after the season.
As stated at the top of this blog, Chris Pronger would have been the choice if he’d come to Philly even one season earlier. But ranking players based on their impact over the decade favors players who spent longer periods of time with the club.
Derian Hatcher’s chronic knee problems ultimately ended his career but he was a gamer for the Flyers after signing as a free agent after the 2004-05 lockout. There were pluses and minuses to having him in the lineup but his competitive level was off the charts.
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A couple preseason updates on European prospects as the start of the Euro regular seasons loom:
* Joacim Eriksson is not playing today for SAIK against Lulea HF. In his last outing, he turned back of 22 of 24 shots but took a hard-luck loss.
* Simon Bertilsson played about 18 minutes and was a plus-one for Brynas in his last game.
* Andrei Popov played second-line right wing for Traktor Chelyabinsk today and did not record a point in the club's 2-0 win against Czech team Karlovy Vary.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
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