Editors’ Note: Noted Philadelphia Flyers fan John Saquella is going beyond 140 characters. The man most of you probably know from social media as @jsaquella will bring you his wide-ranging opinion and commentary on the Orange and Black in his column Putting On The Foil.
By John Saquella (@jsaquella)
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If you were the GM of the Philadelphia Flyers, what would you do to right the ship?
All of us have a bit of the armchair GM in us, it’s part of the lure of sports and the basis of hours and hours of conversations about the sports we love so dearly. We are all sure, deep in our hearts, that we could be the next Keith Allen, if only given the chance.
As anyone who follows me on twitter knows, I routinely engage in discussions about potential moves, and the direction of the Flyers…perhaps obsessively so. But I digress. Over the next few blogs, I will share my views on what kind of moves I would like to see made by the Flyers, and try to give an insight to my rationale behind the ideas I suggest.
For starters, I believe the three main issues that the Flyers face, in order are:
-the lack of mobility and puck skills on defense
-too much redundancy on the roster
-a lack of hockey smarts on the roster
The first point is obvious, and goes sort of hand in hand with the second point. The Flyers have two defensemen who can be said to have above average mobility in Braydon Coburn and Erik Gustafsson. Coburn is a solid veteran, who lacks top end hockey sense. Gustafsson is a promising young puck moving defenseman, who is small & somewhat injury prone. The rest are grouped by big & slow (Nicklas Grossmann and Luke Schenn), slow and ineffective (Andrej Meszaros) and slow and old (Kimmo Timonen & Mark Streit).
Streit still possesses decent puck handling and passing ability. The Flyers are likely stuck with him because of his age and contract. Unfortunately, because of the rest of the personnel, they have to lean too heavily on Streit. Timonen was once a near elite defenseman, who relied on smarts and grit to overcome a lack of size. Unfortunately, he’s lost a step or two and is now prone to getting beat and being forced to take obstruction penalties because of it. He can still play, but counting on him for top pair minutes isn’t really an optimal strategy.
Schenn and Grossmann are both capable of being solid, stay at home, mauler types. The issue here is fundamental mistakes that lead to breakdowns. Grossmann, at times, handles the puck like it’s a live hand grenade. Schenn is more prone to glaring coverage mistakes and poor reads. When that happens, neither guy has the footspeed to erase their mistake, and the deficiencies of their partners make it doubly hard to cover the mistakes.
The redundancies up front are not as drastic, but they do lead to trouble. The Flyers forward corps is a mix of higher skilled, playmaker types and grind it out, score dirty goal guys. There’s not an out and out sniper, or even a winger with a “shoot first” mentality. This leads to overpassing and over pursuit of the puck at times. It also leads to odd man rushes, because the forwards tend to get caught up ice too often, leaving the defense to fend for itself.
The overall lack of hockey sense kind of permeates everything. Just flat out dumb plays at bad times by both forwards and defensemen have cost the Flyers approximately 10 points in the standings, by my estimation, this season. In a league where parity reigns-especially in the Eastern conference- that can be a killer.
Despite these issues, I think that the Flyers first step should not necessarily be to tear down the walls on a massive rebuild, rather, make moves to adjust the mix. Some can-and should be made prior to the trade deadline, others will be available in the summer or via free agency. Some of the upcoming blogs will deal with a lot of supposition, but I will try to be as realistic as I can be…i.e, no suggesting that the Flyers should trade Scott Hartnell and Luke Schenn for Max Pacioretty & PK Subban.
I hope my blogs over the next few days help spur conversation and give your hockey Jones a fix during the roster freeze. First I will examine the trade bait the Flyers have on hand and which pieces I consider to be vital moving forward.
The post Putting On The Foil with @jsaquella: If you were the GM of the Flyers, what would you do to right the ship? appeared first on The Hockey Guys.