Confirmed with Link: Flyers trade Cutter Gauthier to Anaheim for Jamie Drysdale and 2025 2nd round pick

[GKJ]

(EDIT)

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[Beef Invictus]

I see we have moved the "players don't hate Torts" goalpost, to "the players that hate Torts suck who cares what they think".

As if the idea that Gauthier would hate playing for Torts is so farfetched. This is a coach voted most hated across the leauge by the players, who has beefed with 5 roster players (that we know of) already in his 1.5 year tenure, not to mention notoriously beefed with other players at every stop he's coached. But after *months* of telling us Cutter was an integral part of the future, now we question his ceiling. "We don't want players that don't want to play for Torts (even though everyone loves Torts), because that means something is wrong with them".

The excuses are baked into the narrative. Any line contrary to how great Torts is obviously hater non-sense. Nothing any player/executive/reporter could ever say will ever change the Torts boot licker's mind, because Torts can't possible be wrong. And neither can the advisers who advocate for him for that matter.

The funniest part will be five years after he's out of the job when these people pretend like they disapproved the whole time.

 

[Hollywood Cannon]

From my POV, if Fletcher said one thing, that doesn't mean Danny is beholden to it. Also the situation changed drastically when leadership changed. It seems like under Fletcher, the fit with the plan was fine, but under new leadership, the fit wasn't there. I don't think it's really something you can point fingers at anybody about, as more as the relationship is simply a casualty of the larger change the Flyers are looking to make. It's a shitty situation both ways.

As a brand-new GM, you cannot hold to all the old GM's promises. You can't let a prospect roll over you either. You need to assert yourself as the leader of the organization, you need to assert your plan to rebuild, and Danny did that. I cannot begrudge him for it at all.

If there's anybody here that looks bad, it's CG imho, for his complete lack of professionalism and communication. I get he was pissed off about the money, but it's just money at the end of the day. I personally would rather have guys that play for the love of the game as the #1 reason, not money. That's the same approach I have to my job, I truly love what I do, and yes, I'm paid well for it, but money is secondary to the work itself. You don't become truly great at something because you like money... And I'll leave it at that.

You say that Gauthier had complete lack of professionalism and communication but by your framing of the events he was quite clear to franchises pre-draft that he would only play one year of college hockey. When the Flyers proceeded to push that they entered f*** around and find out territory.

By itself, yes, Briere is not beholden to anything that that Fletcher promised or did BUT he probably should have checked around with people in the franchise and found out about your TOP PROSPECT saying he would only play one year of college hockey. That falls on him, you bend the knee at that point or you reap what you sew.

Finally, we're definitely never going to agree on the "it's just money." It's these players' job and they have a finite time clock to get all of the money that they can. I can't put a percentage on it but i'd wager that a very large portion of professional athletes don't play these games for "the love of the game" they do it for the cash and that's perfectly within their right.

 

[Danko]

Just listened to Frank Seravalli on Daily Face Off with Colby Cohen, Frank says that the reason the flyers had to call 18-20 teams is because they knew that cutter would not sign with 10+ other teams. Kid apparently had a list.

 

[Beef Invictus]

Where there's smoke, there's fire... no doubt.
However, what's the average shelflife of a HC in the NHl? A young man just drafted by an org already afraid of potentially spending a year or two under a potential difficult coach ... so scared ... this is also pretty telling.

I don't think he's scared. I think he is looking out for his best interest. If you're watching how this team and coach have handled multiple young players, it would be justified to worry that they would minimize your income when it's contract time.

 

[BritainStix]

Let’s see what happens.

I don’t buy one word that comes from the mouths of these rats. Anything to preserve the image of the country club.

Rebuilds are not drafting 13th overall. This isn’t a rebuild. It’s a half ass retool attempt as always. Don’t fall for their BS.

Lol wut?

Everyone in hockey circles penciled the flyers in for a top 3 pick this year. They are outplaying their roster by some margin. What do you expect Briere to do? Start trading everyone for pennies on the dollar to drop out ranking?

This season has done wonders for Seeler and Walkers trade value.

 

[Beef Invictus]

Has any Flyer player demanded a trade? Lot's of players around the league do so every season.

The only two players who criticized Torts in CBJ were Dubinsky (after he was demoted to the 3rd line and then released a year later), and a scrub. Even Dubois, who clashed with Torts, went out of his way to state his trade demands were an issue with the GM, not Torts.

Hayes? Who cares, he fought the move to RW and either couldn't or wouldn't play defense - what coach wouldn't ream him a new one?

Torts isn't "hated," he just has a reputation that intimidates a lot of players, probably b/c a lot of players don't like being pushed (Hayes is a good example). AV, for example, was a far bigger asshole than Torts. Cassidy was forced out of Boston by his players (who then went belly up in the 1st rd while Cassidy kissed the Cup).

Why was Tortorella voted the most hated coach in the league by players with twice as many votes as Babcock?

 

[Hockeyville USA]

Just listened to Frank Seravalli on Daily Face Off with Colby Cohen, Frank says that the reason the flyers had to call 18-20 teams is because they knew that cutter would not sign with 10+ other teams. Kid apparently had a list.

Canada, Buffalo, Columbus, and mystery team is my guess.

 

[Hollywood Cannon]

You wonder how much he's willing to do whatever it takes to win a Stanley Cup. There's a reason why most Cup winning rosters are disproportionately Canadian: they will do whatever it takes to win a Cup. Not saying that Cutter doesn't care as much (his dad is Canadian so the Cup is likely revered), but someone whose priorities are elsewhere are a big red flag to me. But the Flyers organization may have just botched this entirely.

Come on now.

 

[Cody Webster]

Lets not pretend Cutter didnt need another year in college. He wasnt / isnt some finished product so if he did bail on the team because he didnt want to play a 2nd year in college, I blame him for that more. Just my opinion. He has an inflated view of his current ability.

This is also a fair point

 

[Hockeyville USA]

Come on now.

It's true though

 

[Appleyard]

Since 2012 Flyers are 22nd in NHL cumulative standings.
Since 2020 Flyers are 26th in NHL cumulative standings.
This will likely be the 5th season in a row without making the play-offs.
They will have made play-offs likely 4x in 13 years at the end of the season.
Aside from Michkov they don't have any other potential "star" prospects/young players.

The franchise has been in turmoil for pretty much a decade. Lot of bad press really.
The city/fanbase is known for being pretty crazy, getting on guys etc.
The Head Coach is the least liked coach/one most players dont want to play for in the league according to players polls.
They have a totally novice front office.

I mean, it sucks, but understandable to a degree why a player would not want to come here.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

Guys, forget your personal thoughts about athletes and money and all of that. That’s not relevant to Briere’s thought process. Or at least it shouldn’t be.

They thought they had a potential 1C/1LW and they apparently were willing to risk the relationship over ELC timing. That’s the story. They lost sight of the big picture. Period.

 

[FlyerNutter]

Lol wut?

Everyone in hockey circles penciled the flyers in for a top 3 pick this year. They are outplaying their roster by some margin. What do you expect Briere to do? Start trading everyone for pennies on the dollar to drop out ranking?

This season has done wonders for Seeler and Walkers trade value.

Pennies on the dollar….

No I would have expected him to trade men before the season began, even if they (incorrectly) would have chosen to keep TK.

They put themselves into this position.

Trading the low picking fruit in Walker/Seeler (I’ll believe it when I see it) - is such lazy management.

If you wish to believe this is a path to a successful rebuild, after also moving one of their apparent “core pieces” for an injury prone defenseman, by all means. After Patrick, and Ellis one would have thought they learned.

They are being laughed at yet again, and rightfully so.

 

[Hollywood Cannon]

It's true though

 

[flyershockey]

I'm not sure I buy the ELC thing as being the primary cause, but whatever. I'm sure every player would prefer to start getting paid earlier, but the Flyers still held his rights for well beyond one year. His agent would and should be reminding his client of that. It's not like the Flyers have a history of going really conservative with core pieces as they approach their UFA years. If anything, they tend to jump too early and get themselves into future holes with long term contracts.

And even if it were true, why the hell would the Flyers not just bite the bullet? They certainly didn't have an over-crowded roster. They were the third worst team in the whole conference.

 

[Beef Invictus]

The Flyers wanted a change of culture. They've successfully installed a regime that turns away young players off the ice while preaching a doomed, unsustainable system on the ice. Once again some people don't realize the problem that everyone is complaining about isn't Cutter, Giroux, Ghost, Hayes, DeAngelo, Deslaurieurs, Provorov.... it's that ~this~ is exactly the culture that management wants. This is what they strived for the whole time. All the "we don't care who you are" and "be a f***ing Flyer"... it's all a dogwhistle for ~this~. They're happy. That's the problem. They're serendipitously eating rotten sushi for lunch because they think it's delicious while everyone looks on wondering what the f*** is wrong with them.

The first alarm was sounded when Hextall talked about how high draft picks have it too easy so he wanted to add artificial futility and adversity into their lives. That mindset is one thing they loved about Hextall and they've eagerly built on his foundation for years. It is the most disastrous thing Hextall did.

 

[Hollywood Cannon]

I'm not sure I buy the ELC thing as being the primary cause, but whatever. I'm sure every player would prefer to start getting paid earlier, but the Flyers still held his rights for well beyond one year. His agent would and should be reminding his client of that. It's not like the Flyers have a history of going really conservative with core pieces as they approach their UFA years. If anything, they tend to jump too early and get themselves into future holes with long term contracts.

And even if it were true, why the hell would the Flyers not just bite the bullet? They certainly didn't have an over-crowded roster. They were the third worst team in the whole conference.

Arrogance or things being lost in the chaos of "change."

It's perfectly Flyer.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

And even if it were true, why the hell would the Flyers not just bite the bullet? They certainly didn't have an over-crowded roster. They were the third worst team in the whole conference.

The answer is in this thread. How many people are deep in their feelings puffing up their chests and saying you can’t let a kid push you around? That feels like hockey and this franchise. Can’t get out of their own way.

 

[FLYguy3911]

In the offseason Briere alluded to them trying to sign Cutter for this season but he wanted to go back to BC. Now I’m pretty sure that was after the WCs where Cutter apparently broke things off so maybe he was in his lying stage, but I don’t think the contract had anything to do with it. If he was dead set on getting to UFA at 25 (he couldn’t btw) risking the team calling your bluff and staying in school for four years to go UFA was quite the risk on his part.

 

[MayonnaiseOreo]

Moving Gauthier should have been a step back, but they found a way to get “nhl ready talent” - which I am sure was a must have.

Cutting corners as always.

Drysdale is 21 and still a young prospect.

So many of you are being huge babies about this and quite frankly it's a little embarrassing seeing some of you all act like this.

If the trade happened because Cutter wanted to play in the NHL this year and is mad he didn't get his money then f*** him. We don't need kids with egos like that when he wasn't NHL ready. God forbid the Flyers actually try to develop their talent for once instead of rushing them into the league.

I think Briere and Jones handled this probably as well as they could have. Maybe there could've been a better return but we got a prospect + a 2nd for a guy that's never stepped foot on NHL ice.

I'm bummed Cutter didn't want to play here and I'm as shocked as anyone else about the trade but there's still a ton of potential in Drysdale.

 

[Danko]

Looking back on this with the facts that we have from last night....ASF and Snow The Goalie guys (who i typically like to listen to) come off as a complete joke. ASF in particular with his "nugget" about Kevin Hayes, guy needs to check his sources more often.

Was immediately surprised with how little the return was, i mean respect to Drysdale but Cutter would seem to me to have a much higher value....however looking back at it all i guess he did the best he could.

Crazy stuff here

• This dates back to the fletcher era
• Jones was never able to have a single conversation with the kids people.
• Kid ghosted the team, his advisors advised him poorly.
• Held the flyers by the balls and maintained a no trade list of over 10 teams
• Wouldn't talk with John Leclair or Patrick Sharp
• Sent the college coach out to tell Leclair and Sharp that he wasn't going to talk to them...disrespectful.
• Jones and Briere flew out to Sweden and Cutter wouldn't even talk to them.

 

[Curufinwe]

It's true though

8 of the top 9 players on the 2020 Cup champs weren't Canadian

Vasilveksy
Hedman
Sergachev
Kucherov
McDonagh
Palat
Cernak
Shattenkirk

 

[FadeToBlack]

You say that Gauthier had complete lack of professionalism and communication but by your framing of the events he was quite clear to franchises pre-draft that he would only play one year of college hockey. When the Flyers proceeded to push that they entered f*** around and find out territory.

By itself, yes, Briere is not beholden to anything that that Fletcher promised or did BUT he probably should have checked around with people in the franchise and found out about your TOP PROSPECT saying he would only play one year of college hockey. That falls on him, you bend the knee at that point or you reap what you sew.

Finally, we're definitely never going to agree on the "it's just money." It's these players' job and they have a finite time clock to get all of the money that they can. I can't put a percentage on it but i'd wager that a very large portion of professional athletes don't play these games for "the love of the game" they do it for the cash and that's perfectly within their right.

So teams should just sign guys that aren't ready for the NHL because that's what they want? The NHL is earned, not given. Cutter didn't earn it with his play at BC against men. He was decent, not great. He would absolutely have been in the dog house with Torts for a good chunk of this year because he simply wasn't ready for NHL time, regardless of what he thinks. Believe it or not, professional talent evaluators tend to be a bit more objective than the talent themselves.

I'm guessing Danny knew what was up, but was also probably operating under the idea of getting things straightened out organizationally, and getting the locker room right, BEFORE bringing CG into it, as an impressionable young man making his big-league debut. I have no problem at all with that conservativeness.

I actually know NHL'ers and have hung out with them and a lot of these guys are hockey mad. They eat, live and breathe hockey and fitness, 24/7. You can't live a lifestyle like that without being passionate about the sport. You simply don't get to the league and stick in the league if you're in it for a paycheck. I'm not saying they don't like the money, or don't appreciate it, or the NHL lifestyle, I'm saying those need to be secondary motivators behind the love of the game for 95% of these guys. That other 5% have the natural tools to be great at hockey regardless of their motivations.

 

[Beef Invictus]

A lot of peoppe still seemingly think this is an issue with losing Gauthier(most people werent fond of the pick anyway), and they couldnt be further from the mark. It's about terrible process, and not realizing that constantly playing players like Deslauriers over giving kids ice time (cant have a kid on the 4th line!) And all these other dumb dinosaur tropes are driving them away from the new generation of players.

You can cater your audience to these bully watchers all you want, but this is the flip side of that. You have situations like this where kids with a limited career span have to maximize their earning potential (10-15 years) in a situation where they are already heavily restricted/capped on earnings for about a third of that. Keep your goons if you want, but its limiting roster space, which is limiting opportunities, especially in an organizarion who already has publicly admitted to playing vets for milestones over kids for development..

It's this 1,0000000,000,009,00,0,00%

As always the biggest problem is the underlying processes. Far more than the players involved.

They have no plan beyond "Olds Are Best, Be Mean To Kids."

 

[Curufinwe]

Looking back on this with the facts that we have from last night....ASF and Snow The Goalie guys (who i typically like to listen to) come off as a complete joke. ASF in particular with his "nugget" about Kevin Hayes, guy needs to check his sources more often.

Was immediately surprised with how little the return was, i mean respect to Drysdale but Cutter would seem to me to have a much higher value....however looking back at it all i guess he did the best he could.

Crazy stuff here

• This dates back to the fletcher era
• Jones was never able to have a single conversation with the kids people.
• Kid ghosted the team, his advisors advised him poorly.
• Held the flyers by the balls and maintained a no trade list of over 10 teams
• Wouldn't talk with John Leclair or Patrick Sharp
• Sent the college coach out to tell Leclair and Sharp that he wasn't going to talk to them...disrespectful.
• Jones and Briere flew out to Sweden and Cutter wouldn't even talk to them.

If he knew that he didn't want to play in Philly, why should he sit down and get lectured to by a bunch of Flyer flunkies?