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Quick Hits: September 19, 2023
1) Flyers general manager Danny Briere will speak to the media at the FTC in Voorhees this morning at 10:30 a.m. EDT. Topics likely to be addressed include the start of NHL training camp this week, his observations on Rookie Camp and the two Rookies Series games in Allentown last Friday and Saturday, goals for the upcoming season and more. The Briere presser will be available Flyers social media and the team's YouTube channel.
2) Yesterday, on the penultimate day of Rookie Camp, Flyers assistant general manager Brent Flahr met with the media to discuss the prospects in camp, the Rookies Series and the play of Matvei Michkov.
Flyers Assistant General Manager Brent Flahr met with the media on Monday to discuss 2023 Rookie Camp and our pool of prospects. pic.twitter.com/Hq6JTTJIuX
3) Among the undrafted/uncontracted invitees in Flyers Rookie Camp, 24-year-old forward Matt Brown is arguably the player who has made the strongest impression. In addition to scoring a power play goal in last Friday's Rookies Game against the Rangers, his speed and hustle have been evident both in practices and the two games. Notably, he played in the top-six of the forward rotation during the Rookie Series, including time with Elliot Desnoyers and Tyson Foerster in the second game.
Brown, who signed an AHL tryout deal last April with the Phantoms after completing his college career with Boston University (two seasons at UMass-Lowell, two seasons at BU), did not appear in any games for the Phantoms but practiced with the team. He is currently an unrestricted free agent.
The vibe from Flahr's press conference yesterday was that Brown has impressed enough to earn an American Hockey League contract with the Phantoms for the 2023-24 season. He'd have the opportunity, depending on his play, to potentially earn a two-way NHL contract.
4) Today is the final day of Rookie Camp. Practice is slated for 11:30 a.m. EDT. Tomorrow is the official reporting date for NHL Camp, but all attendees have been in Voorhees since last week. They've been practicing with no coaches on the ice before the Rookies Practice starts each day. There is no on-ice work slated for tomorrow. NHL camp attendees will have their medical exams and physical testing. Come Thursday, it will be time for John Tortorella's rigorous skating tests for all attendees. Pucks will hit the ice for the first time on Friday.
5) At the conclusion of Rookie Camp, Flyers 2023 fourth-round pick Alex Ciernik will depart for Sweden to play for Allsvenskan team Västerviks IK. The team gave Ciernik permission to come overseas to attend Flyers Rookie Camp -- it is not the norm for players signed to European club teams to be able to attend an NHL Rookie Camp -- and he made the most of it by sniping a goal and showing off his speed and stickhandling prowess in last Friday's game.
After the game, I asked Ciernik if his dad, former NHL forward Ivan Ciernik, had given him any advice before he came to his first NHL Rookie Camp. He replied that his father didn't want to fill his head with too much to think about and simply wanted him to soak in the experience. Alex iwas born from Slovakia and plays for the Slovakian junior national team, but he was largely raised in Germany (where Ivan played professionally for years after his NHL stint) and Sweden. He's also fluent in English, making him quadrilingual.
5) Matvei Michkov chipped in a third period assist in HC Sochi's 5-3 home win over Severstal Cherepovets on Monday. The eventual goal, scored by Amir Garayev, capped off an impressive sequence in which Michkov doled out a reverse hit to fend off a defender on the right wing and then dished an accurate pass across the ice to Danila Galenyuk. Michkov, who had three shots on goal in yesterday's game and 10 in the previous game (although he did not record a point), now has three assists in three games for Sochi. The player, who had nine goals in 27 games for Sochi last season, is still searching for his first goal of the 2023-24 season.
6) Flyers prospect Samu Tuomaala achieved a personal mini-milestone yesterday as he did his first-ever solo media session in English. He's understood basic English for a number of years and would answer questions he felt comfortable enough to express himself but he always had either Sami Kapanen or Sami Sandell beside him to translate as needed. I noticed in the locker room after Friday's game that Tuomaala was comfortable chatting in English with the trainers. Yesterday was another step forward in day-to-day communications and deserved to be commended. The questions he fielded were all routine subjects, but he answered with confidence. He'll only keep getting better and more comfortable over the course of the 2023-24 season as he spends his first full year in North America.
7) On PhiladelphiaFlyers.com, I wrote a short article about the return of the center ice double logo: The origin of why, for many years, the Flyers and Canadiens were the only teams to feature that design on their home rinks and the symbolism of why the Flyers brought it back this year after a three-year absence. The Flyers will be the only NHL team to have a double-logo at center ice in 2023-24.
8) Phantoms/Flyers defenseman Adam Ginning also spoke with the media yesterday. He discussed his solid rookie season in the American Hockey League, his NHL debut late season, his goal of challenging for an NHL job this season, how he views his identity as a player, and how he'd like his last name to be pronounced by the American media.
Around the Flyers/Phantoms, Ginning's last name is pronounced with an "American J" (as in a beverage with gin) and he's nicknamed "Ginner". In Swedish, depending on the word itself and the vowel that comes after it, the letter "G" is either a soft consonant as in the word "go" or it has a "y" sound. In fact, if you go the native speaker pronunciation link on Ginning's Elite Prospects page, his name is rendered as "ah-DAHM YIN-ning"). The player himself said on Tuesday that he prefers "Jinning" for the pronunciation.
This is hardly uncommon. Many European players, especially Swedes, are fine with their names being anglicized. They grow up watching American movies and television, so our pronunciations are already comfortable-sounding to the majority. I remember former Flyers defenseman Christian Folin saying that he'd been "Follen" rather than "Foo-leen" for so long that he'd come to pronounce it the English-style way himself). Another example: Peter Forsberg or Mikael Renberg introducing themselves as -berg rather than as -berj (which sounds something in between a Swedish j as in Johan or -berry in English).
This concludes today's (pidgin) language lesson. At any rate, if you pronounce Ginning's surname as Jinning, the Phantoms/Flyers defenseman not only won't mind it, he'd prefer it.
9) September 19 Flyers Alumni birthdays: Scott Daniels (1969), Gilbert Dionne (1970), Nolan Patrick (1998), Joni Pitkanen (1983).
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