2022/23 Roster Thread III: Run It Back!

[Curufinwe]

van Reimsdyk - Couturier - Konecny
Laughton - Hayes - Atkinson
Cates - Frost - Tippett
Deslauries - Brown - MacEwen

Provorov - DeAngelo
Sanheim - Ristolainen
York - Braun

Hart
Sandstrom

That could be their opening night roster.

And it could be even worse if anyone else gets hurt.

York isn’t playing over Seeler and Braun as a regular

York will play ahead of Seeler. He already did that for most of the 2nd half of last season and averaged 6 minutes more per game.

 

[TheKingPin]

And it could be even worse if anyone else gets hurt.


York will play ahead of Seeler. He already did that for most of the 2nd half of last season and averaged 6 minutes more per game.

Couturier injury away as Kevin Hayes being your number 1C. Couts always misses time. Loving the tank for this year. Get the 1OA and fire Fletcher as well as Clarke, Holmgren, and Scott and we will be flying high.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

i don't buy that. Problem with a lot of players is the roles they play at lower levels doesn't prepare them for the NHL, where they're not going to be a star - it's one thing to let Makar free lance (uber talent) and I notice he's defensively responsible for someone who is always in attack mode. It's another to let a good but not great offensive player ignore their defensive responsibilities.

Attard has offensive talents, but he's not the kind of D-man who can outskate his mistakes. You can give those guys a bit more leeway as they learn. Attard was getting burned left and right his first couple weeks, then adjusted his game. I think they want him to master defensive basics (do we need another Risto?) then learn when to take chances on offense.

We see this all the time in the NBA, college kids come out and have all the offensive moves, but not a clue about playing defense, and at the pro level get hung out to dry - and thus benched until they learn to at least not be a turnstile. Same with NHL defensemen, you have to be good enough on defense, and know when to take chances on offense - unless you're Carlsson or some other great offensive talent who can outscore his mistakes. And even OEL never scored enough to stop being a liability.

Perhaps I could have phrased that better. Defense is important. Defensive effectiveness is also VERY different from defensive tools, but that's a different subject.

How many times have you told me 4th liners have to be X or Bottom 6ers have Y attributes? I think you could not possibly be more accurate in your representation of their developmental tracks. Everyone is pigeon-holed and that's how it stays.

This isn't about Vorobyev or Frost or anyone else specific. It's the quantity proving systemic failure. I didn't watch LHV last year, so I won't speak to it. But previously, they might as well have stamped NHL roles on players' heads. Hockey is hockey. There's nothing magical about playing on the 4th line just because tradition says there is. Whatever you gain by having "defined roles" or other buzzword they prefer, you more than cancel out by simply playing lesser players by design.

Yes, 4th liners were typically that because of lack of meaningful talent depth. Why is any team making lineup or developmental decisions based on another team's talent pool? Why make giving up on maxing players out a feature rather than a bug?

In essence, they're not hitting any developmental home runs. They're hitting singles with the occasional double because that's what they're trying to do. They're succeeding at a nonsensical thing.

 

[Starat327]

 

[LegionOfDoom91]

 

[renberg]

The bolded is a defining factor of the org at this point. They develop into molds.

The sign of a good coach is one that can take any mix of talent and create a system of play that gets the most out of them. It's why there aren't many good coaches in the NHL. These guys are usually one trick ponies. They'll look good when they have exactly what they need. If they have to adjust, they're lost.

 

[flyersnorth]

FWIW, the Athletic graded all 32 teams and how did they did in free agency.

The Flyers got an F. Only one other team got an F - the Minnesota Wild.

Philadelphia Flyers: F​

The Flyers didn’t merely miss out Gaudreau, the local superstar and top free agent on the market who long had been rumored to have Philadelphia as his top choice. They weren’t even realistically in the mix due to Chuck Fletcher’s inability to adequately prepare from a cap-space standpoint or clear out a contract or two. So what did Fletcher do? He brought back Justin Braun to be a cheap third-pair defenseman and signed a 31-year-old enforcer in Nicolas Deslauriers to a four-year contract. Braun isn’t an upgrade since he already was in Philadelphia for most of the 2021-22 season, and Deslauriers is an intangibles add to a team that already has Rasmus Ristolainen and Zack MacEwenfor essentially the same purpose. The Flyers had the fourth-worst record in hockey last season, and unless their big swing on Tony DeAngelo bears fruit and doesn’t blow up in their face, it’s unclear if they’re actually any better than they were in 2021-22. Yikes. — Charlie O’Connor

 

[wankstifier]

I'd watch 2-3 losing seasons if they had a young star and a clear plan to become a contender.

 

[deadhead]

Perhaps I could have phrased that better. Defense is important. Defensive effectiveness is also VERY different from defensive tools, but that's a different subject.

How many times have you told me 4th liners have to be X or Bottom 6ers have Y attributes? I think you could not possibly be more accurate in your representation of their developmental tracks. Everyone is pigeon-holed and that's how it stays.

This isn't about Vorobyev or Frost or anyone else specific. It's the quantity proving systemic failure. I didn't watch LHV last year, so I won't speak to it. But previously, they might as well have stamped NHL roles on players' heads. Hockey is hockey. There's nothing magical about playing on the 4th line just because tradition says there is. Whatever you gain by having "defined roles" or other buzzword they prefer, you more than cancel out by simply playing lesser players by design.

Yes, 4th liners were typically that because of lack of meaningful talent depth. Why is any team making lineup or developmental decisions based on another team's talent pool? Why make giving up on maxing players out a feature rather than a bug?

In essence, they're not hitting any developmental home runs. They're hitting singles with the occasional double because that's what they're trying to do. They're succeeding at a nonsensical thing.

I think there's a good case to be made that Gordon was an awful mistake as the AHL HC, he wanted to get back to the NHL so he coached to win, not to develop players. And as we saw when he was interim HC, the team lost some of the structure (for good or evil) that Hakstol had imposed.

If you watched LHV last year, they did "more with less," they were undermanned all season due to injuries and call ups, but were a better coached team, I think Macleish can verify that, he watches all the games. Whether it's Lappy, his assistants, or both, I leave to others to determine. Last year they had a number of players improve, Hodgson and Willman out of the ECHL, Zamula, Hogberg, Sandin (couldn't stay healthy)

I think the development failure was a combination of scouting and coaching. The scouting emphasis on 'safe' mid-round picks who played the "Flyer way' meant there weren't many prospects with upside.

Coordination between Torts and Lappy, getting LHV on the same page with the NHL team, should be an organizational priority - I don't think AV gave LHV a second thought - he was here to win today and screw tomorrow.

 

[LegionOfDoom91]

FWIW, the Athletic graded all 32 teams and how did they did in free agency.

The Flyers got an F. Only one other team got an F - the Minnesota Wild.

Philadelphia Flyers: F​

The Flyers didn’t merely miss out Gaudreau, the local superstar and top free agent on the market who long had been rumored to have Philadelphia as his top choice. They weren’t even realistically in the mix due to Chuck Fletcher’s inability to adequately prepare from a cap-space standpoint or clear out a contract or two. So what did Fletcher do? He brought back Justin Braun to be a cheap third-pair defenseman and signed a 31-year-old enforcer in Nicolas Deslauriers to a four-year contract. Braun isn’t an upgrade since he already was in Philadelphia for most of the 2021-22 season, and Deslauriers is an intangibles add to a team that already has Rasmus Ristolainen and Zack MacEwenfor essentially the same purpose. The Flyers had the fourth-worst record in hockey last season, and unless their big swing on Tony DeAngelo bears fruit and doesn’t blow up in their face, it’s unclear if they’re actually any better than they were in 2021-22. Yikes. — Charlie O’Connor

Two teams that Chuck Fletcher put in cap hell.

 

[wankstifier]

Two teams that Chuck Fletcher put in cap hell.

Was looking at their contracts and couldn't find anything too bad. Then I scrolled down to the dead cap section. Woof.

 

[deadhead]

Yeah the Flyers have a serious problem with prospect development. It was league consensus that they had one of the better prospect pools, but now they have nothong to show for it. Now if every other prospect doesnt live up to their potential thats just the way it goes, you cant nail every pick. But when nearly every single (well regarded) prospect that goes through this organization fails to live up to their potential it is obviously a more systemic issue. Like, they finally stopped drafting to fill roles under Hextall, but they still try to coach the players that they drafted into those roles anyways.

Thing is the "well regarded" prospects generally spend very little time in the system - TK, Patrick, Provorov, Farabee were all in the NHL at 19. Gauthier will probably go directly to Philly in 2023-24. York, Allison, Laczynski spent little time in the AHL (the latter two were more rehab last year than anything).

Sanheim did get some AHL time and steadily improved - but that was also his MO in junior hockey, he needed time to adjust at each level.

Lindblom was developed in the SHL and just needed to adjust to NA ice, we'll probably see the same with Lycksell this year, who made his big jump in the SHL.

Frost was an example of yo-yo development, probably should have just stayed in the AHL for a full season instead of up and down at 20, then got hurt at 21, which set him back.

Where development "failed" was with the 2nd tier guys who often need 1-2 years to marinate in the AHL (which is why they're second tier guys and drafted after the 1st rd). But it's hard to distinguish bad development from bad drafting - FLyers tended to draft "safe' (high floor, low ceiling) guys who played the "Flyer way.' So not sure how much could be done with them - can you really coach Bunnaman into a modicum of offensive skill?

 

[Beef Invictus]

Charlie mentioned something about Attard on the BSH podcast. How Attard is aggressive defensively, jumps up offensively. Said he's a weird player without a comparable NHL player. So he asked one of the dev coaches who are they having him watch tape of, and was told essentially, "Cernak in the defensive zone." Basically, they said they wanted Attard to take Cernak's defensive style and make it his own, dial his offense way down. Then when he has the defense down, they'll start adding some of the offense back.

I've been checked out on the prospects for a while, so I don't know how accurate his read on Attard is, but Charlie was arguing that it was a bad process since their defensive styles are too different, and your undermining anything he does well to try to be something else.

Yet I'm repeatedly told the team is not bad at development

 

[deadhead]

Charlie mentioned something about Attard on the BSH podcast. How Attard is aggressive defensively, jumps up offensively. Said he's a weird player without a comparable NHL player. So he asked one of the dev coaches who are they having him watch tape of, and was told essentially, "Cernak in the defensive zone." Basically, they said they wanted Attard to take Cernak's defensive style and make it his own, dial his offense way down. Then when he has the defense down, they'll start adding some of the offense back.

I've been checked out on the prospects for a while, so I don't know how accurate his read on Attard is, but Charlie was arguing that it was a bad process since their defensive styles are too different, and your undermining anything he does well to try to be something else.

Attard is a difficult issue - his role in college simply isn't going to be his role on any NHL team - he's not a good enough skater to get away with the same gambles. And you saw him adjust the last couple weeks, cutting back on the bad decisions, learning when to pinch and be aggressive and when to tone it down.

Same at the defensive end, you can get away with being aggressive in college b/c how many top 6 NHL forwards do you face (who can make you look silly if you get out of position to try and force a play)? In the NHL, defensemen have to be more disciplined.

College can go to extremes, Cates is the polar opposite, watching him in college in the playoffs, I was disappointed, he looked so meh, then in the NHL he blossomed - but probably no college system stifles offense like Minn-Duluth. However, this also meant in the NHL he could trust his instincts b/c he was never allowed to make reckless gambles.

 

[PALE PWNR]

Are there people trying to convince themselves that this team won't miss Giroux and Farabee is a better offensive player than Giroux???

Or that the same roster that sucked last season is going to do well this season?

 

[deadhead]

Are there people trying to convince themselves that this team won't miss Giroux and Farabee is a better offensive player than Giroux???

Or that the same roster that sucked last season is going to do well this season?

How good do you think 35 year old Giroux is going to be?
In all sports, fans tend to resist accepting that their favorites are aging.
But age curves don't lie. Time to move on.

It'll be a different team this year, let's see what Torts can do with these young players.

 

[FlyerNutter]

It’s quite hilarious to me to see Torts trotted out there like a young thoroughbred. The primary marketing tool this off-season.

By the same management team, that selected Vigneault - and kept him along with Therrien well past any logical expiration date.

 

[TB87]

Yet I'm repeatedly told the team is not bad at development

The Flyers are (beginning?) to do what dumb teams do with Attard, as described in the following article: How to Ruin a Player

 

[Diaper Mask Bandits]

How good do you think 35 year old Giroux is going to be?
In all sports, fans tend to resist accepting that their favorites are aging.
But age curves don't lie. Time to move on.

It'll be a different team this year, let's see what Torts can do with these young players.

35 yr old Giroux is better than Kevin hayes at any age for one thing

Too bad they signed Hayes to that contract, maybe they could have signed Giroux this off-season for less than 7 million per year

not to mention deangelo or Risto

But, I'm rooting for full-blown disaster so I'm not really that upset about it

 

[Beef Invictus]

Attard is a difficult issue - his role in college simply isn't going to be his role on any NHL team - he's not a good enough skater to get away with the same gambles. And you saw him adjust the last couple weeks, cutting back on the bad decisions, learning when to pinch and be aggressive and when to tone it down.

Same at the defensive end, you can get away with being aggressive in college b/c how many top 6 NHL forwards do you face (who can make you look silly if you get out of position to try and force a play)? In the NHL, defensemen have to be more disciplined.

College can go to extremes, Cates is the polar opposite, watching him in college in the playoffs, I was disappointed, he looked so meh, then in the NHL he blossomed - but probably no college system stifles offense like Minn-Duluth. However, this also meant in the NHL he could trust his instincts b/c he was never allowed to make reckless gambles.

The Flyers try to smash the offensive ability and initiative out of every single one of their prospects and it's why every single one of them falls short. The point of hockey is scoring goals and the Flyers breed their teams to be bad at that by design.

They will always suck until their values do a 180 and they value/encourage offense.

 

[Beef Invictus]

Are there people trying to convince themselves that this team won't miss Giroux and Farabee is a better offensive player than Giroux???

Or that the same roster that sucked last season is going to do well this season?

Don't forget they tossed away Lindblom with nothing to replace him. The roster has gotten worse than it was last year, which should have been hard to do.

 

[Starat327]

Today on "people arguing with themselves...."

 

[HeyHanrahan]

Bill Meltzer's article today: "The first two years of Nic Deslauriers' four-year contract include a partial no-trade clause (the player submit a 20-team list). The latter two seasons do not have a no-trade."

A four year contract and a partial no-trade clause for the first two years? For anyone to pay him more than $1 million or so for a term of one or two years is malpractice. Nope, Chuck needed to sign him on the first day of free agency. This signing is the definition of losing in the margins.

 

[LegionOfDoom91]

Are there people trying to convince themselves that this team won't miss Giroux and Farabee is a better offensive player than Giroux???

Or that the same roster that sucked last season is going to do well this season?

Just one person who committed themselves to defending the team no matter years ago & won’t admit they were wrong now.

 

[Diaper Mask Bandits]

Bill Meltzer's article today: "The first two years of Nic Deslauriers' four-year contract include a partial no-trade clause (the player submit a 20-team list). The latter two seasons do not have a no-trade."

A four year contract and a partial no-trade clause for the first two years? For anyone to pay him more than $1 million or so for a term of one or two years is malpractice. Nope, Chuck needed to sign him on the first day of free agency. This signing is the definition of losing in the margins.

A partial no trade clause for a scrub???

is this normal?

Just one person who committed themselves to defending the team no matter years ago & won’t admit they were wrong now.

He spins everything towards the best possible case scenario.
I used to do that sort of thing when I first started sports as a teenager.

I don't know if he's incredibly naive and unrealistic or he's trolling.
He's hinted trolling.

I think its a mix of both