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The Flyers and Tocchet or a Giroux trade: Could it Happen? How Soon? |
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The Flyers are officially at a crossroads. There are no shortages of opinions and the rumor mill is truly going nuts right now.
When you look back at the start of the NHL season, teams in the NHL they tended to fall into the following categories.
1. Teams that were contenders and every knew it.
2. Teams that were improving and had the talent to jump to the first category.
3. Teams that were growing steady and would be a threat to make the playoffs.
4. Teams that were likely to still need a lot more time.
5. Teams in trouble.
The Flyers were in that second category. Most people had them as a playoff team if Carter Hart rebounded, and some saw them as a darkhorse contender with a solid group of veterans like Giroux, Couturier, Hayes, and Provorov….and a really exciting group of youngsters like Konecny, Farabe, Sanheim….and then they made some moves that looked really strong to address the need to win now bringing in Ellis, Ristolainen, and somehow managing to get Atkinson for Voracek. They were risky moves and Ellis especially has turned out so far to be disasterous…Atkinson has shown some very exciting moments and was worth moving Voracek for…
Well, Carter Hart Bounced back….and Giroux has had a great season. But everything else has gone wrong…
So then a coaching change was made. It was needed for sure, and yet they Flyers didn’t choose to bring in a new vision and ad some excitement to a team that was playing badly in Auto-pilot. Instead, almost exactly a month ago, they elevated assistant Mike Yeo to interim coach. When you remove two of your three coaches what you are saying is THOSE coaches were the problem, and this one wasn’t. At first the Flyers played well, hockey players tend to band together and you heard alot of “We are playing for each other…” which is what you get when you don’t bring in a new vision/coach.
But now, over the last 6 or so games that adrenaline has faded back into a malaise. losing 4 in a row…there is talk now of moving Giroux at the deadline…The talent in Philly should NOT be a 13-15-6 with a -24 Goal Diff….That is a BAD team that has lost 22 of their 35 games. And in many haven’t even competed.
Could Giroux be moved?
Sure. But I don’t get the sense that Comcast is ready to even go there with roughly 50 games left. Giroux is not only the captain, but the spiritual leader of this group and he has been playing very well in the final year of his contract. Will he be signing back in Philly? I believe he still wants to, but the only thing I have heard is he could be a major target for the Ottawa Senators…and I think he’d be open to that…other teams? It might freak out Flyers fans, but I wouldn’t be shocked to see him sign in Pittsburgh in the off-season. G and Crosby are close and Hextall of course loves Claude.
Rick Tocchet Anyone?
There are people on the mothership at Comcast who REALLY want Tocchet, a former Flyer and a solid head coach, to be brought in NOW to fix this and try and save this season still. I could see Tocchet really being the perfect fit and infusing the kind of experience and player attitude that the team has lacked since Jagr and Pronger left town. If the Flyers wait and re-evaluate this summer there is good chance that Tocchet gets hired elsewhere….In the old days of Ed Snider this team was never willing to take those kinds of chances.
Tonight San Jose visits Philly and another loss could answer these questions quicker than most people think…
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