Clearly The Flyers Haven’t Learned From Others’ Mistakes: Carter Hart Is Beginning To Draw Some Alarming Similarities To A Young Steve Mason

Although the Flyers’ Carter Hart and goalie Steve Mason were drafted 10 years apart, with Mason being taken in the 3^rd round (69^th overall) of the 2006 NHL Entry Draft by the Columbus Blue Jackets and Hart being taken by the Flyers in the 2^nd round (48^th overall) in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft. Now, though, Hart is beginning to draw some alarming similarities to Mason.

Former Flyers’ Canadian-born goaltender Steve Mason (who is still only 32-years-old) is now retired after just 10 seasons in the league when others from his draft class are still showing that they are in the prime of their careers and competing on an extremely high level. So why the early retirement? To answer that, we have to first look at what led him to this point today and how it may correlate to the Flyers’ Carter Hart and his recent struggles. 

Steve Mason came into the league with quite the impressive pedigree: He won the Ontario Hockey League’s (OHL) Goaltender of the Year award back in ‘06-‘07 (after a 45 win season), followed by winning the OHL’s Championship a year later in ‘07-‘08. Next, he took home the prestigious gold medal (that year) from the World Juniors Championships while playing for Team Canada where he was also presented with the Most Valuable Player award for the tournament, posting an astounding 1.19 goals against average (GAA) with a .951 save percentage (SV%) in five games played (GP) in which he won all five of his starts while posting one shut out in the process. 

With Mason posting such extraordinary numbers up to this point it was easy to see why the Blue Jackets were so eager to get him to Columbus. So much so that Steve only played in just three games for the teams American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate the Syracuse Crunch after turning pro before being called up the big club at the age of just 20-years-old. The Blue Jackets rushed Mason because they were so desperate to find their first ever true franchise goaltender suince they were founded back in 1997 since they had seemingly missed when they drafted goaltender Pascal Leclaire (whom Mason was set to replace) back in 2001 in the 1^st round with their 8^th overall selection. At that time, they sped Leclaire along so he could be their starter at the age of just 21 years of age. Coincidence??

With Mason at the helm, the Blue Jackets rode their rookie goaltender for all he was worth, playing him in 61 games in his inaugural season. Riding this high of being in the NHL, Mason did not disappoint- Carrying his new team to their first ever playoff berth by posting 33 regular-season wins and 10 shutouts in the process! A feat that would be good enough to win him the league’s Calder Trophy that year- An award that is given to the league’s rookie of the year.  

But with any level of success comes subtraction. By this, I mean when a team reaches new heights, players are going to want to be compensated for their efforts.  Thus comes teams losing players that they may have wanted to keep. With Columbus now forced to have to deal with this, Mason saw his GAA steadily increase and his SV% take a nosedive over the course of the next few seasons. This left Blue Jacket fans searching for someone to blame, and the easy choice was Mason, and fans quickly turned on him. Just a season ago- most Columbusites had fed into the hype surrounding their new stud goalie by buying his replica jersey in the stadium’s pro shop.  quickly turned on him. Now, though, Mason found his name in the press- not praising him but bashing him for his play. This sentiment was new to this still-young goaltender, seeing that he had never really experienced losing up to this point. His talents had previously allowed him to win easily at every level of hockey he had ever reached. This trend continued for another couple of years before an even more desperate team (the Flyers) came around inquiring about the possibility of obtaining him to solve their own goaltending problems. 

It wasn’t until April 3^rd, 2013 when Mason was then traded to Philadelphia in exchange for goaltender Michael Leighton and a ’15, 3^rd round pick that Mason got a second chance. With that new start he looked like a form of his old self in the 7 games he played in for the Flyers that year after being acquired, in which he posted a 1.90 GAA and a .944 SV%. Now that he found a new home that appreciated him and were elated to have them there his play seemed to flourish once again the following season where he was able to win 33 games that year out of the 61 games he started, while posting a 2.50 GAA and a .917 SV%. These numbers only got better in the post season where he achieved a 1.97 GAA with a .939 SV%. But in the years following, the team’s defense seemed to deteriorate with the trade of the aging Kimmo Timonen to the Black Hawks in 2015, and Mark Streit to Tampa Bay in 2017. With this, Mason’s stats became nominal (at best) playing at just a .500 level. With these veterans departing, the Flyers’ defense was now more focused on scoring goals than preventing them. The team began to win a game just to lose the next. Sound familiar??? The Flyers are appearing to do this once again. 

With the defense faulting, misdirected blame was then placed on Steve and his recent play. Mason’s name was once again being chastened by every news outlet in the tri-state area. Once again, his play was affected, and he never seemed to recover. Aggravated by his performance and how he was then being treated by the unyielding Philadelphia media, Mason decided to try his hand at free agency and signed a lucrative deal with the Winnipeg Jets where he would continue to struggle once again- even having to be demoted to the AHL ranks for his disappointing play. He was then traded to the Montreal Canadians- a team he would never even suit up for seeing that they took him on so they could get another prospect in a trade and some future pick compensations with the sole purpose of buying Mason out. After being bought out by the Canadians, Mason received no offers from any team the following season and then chose to retire, thus bringing an early end to a career that showed so much promise at its beginning. 

Did you hear any similarities between Steve Mason’s story and what it beginning to occur here in Philadelphia to the struggling young goaltender Carter Hart?

Well then, let’s take a look at Hart’s story, shall we? This now 22-year-old Canadian-born goaltender came to the Flyers with a lot of hype surrounding his game as well when the team’s last franchise-goaltender Ron Hextall decided to draft him some 17 years after he himself took off the pads for the last time as a Flyer. Selecting Carter in the 2^nd round 48^th overall (as the first goaltender taken that year), Hart (much like Mason) seemed to be a prodigy in-between the pipes, not knowing what it was like to lose seeing that he dominated at each and every level of hockey he progressed to this point.  

This trend starting when at just 15-years-old, he won the AAA level Alberta Cup Championship while playing for his hometown team of Sherwood Park. Then, he progressed to the Western Hockey league (WHL) where he played for the Everett Silvertips Carter- and he was able to win the WHL Del Wilson Trophy (award given to the WHL’s best goaltender) three consecutive years in a row in ‘15-‘16, ‘16-‘17, and again in the ‘17-‘18 season. Additionally, Hart was graced with the honor of winning the CHL’s Goaltender of the Year award (given to the best goaltender in all of Canadian junior hockey) twice: Once in the ’15-’16 season, then again in the ’17-’18 season.  That same year Carter also was awarded the WHL’s Four Broncos Trophy (an award gifted to the WHL’s player of the year), and if that wasn’t enough to fill Carter’s trophy case, he went on to win GOLD for Team Canada in the ‘17-‘18 season at the World Junior Championships. 

With all those accolades already under his belt at such an early age, Hart seemed destined to take over the Flyers’ crease rather quickly. So, with Flyers management chomping at the bit to see Carter on Broad Street after just 18 games played for Philadelphia’s AHL affiliate the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, the Flyers called this young netminder up to the NHL (at just 20 years of age). In 31 GP in his rookie campaign, Carter’s play was good enough to be considered for the Calder Trophy, but he didn’t play enough games to be any real competition. This would cause the fans here in the City of Brotherly Love to hold a huge place in their “Harts” for Carter and enthusiastically called for him to take over the blue paint next season.  He did just that: Posting many impressive home starts at the Wells Fargo center where Hart was able to put up 20 wins in 25 games played there that season. This feat would help him take his team to the playoffs where they made it to the brink of the Eastern Conference finals last season before falling to the New York Islanders.   

But, just like Steve’s Blue Jackets when they reached a bit of success, Carter’s Flyers were forced to lose a few intrical pieces: The versatile Tyler Pitlick deciding to seek more money and employment elsewhere via free agency and the team’s shutdown defensemen Matt Niskanen deciding to retire a year before his contract was set to expire. 

These two losses affected the makeup of the Flyers moving forward greatly. Where last season, with those players, the team entered the playoffs after the round robin games ranked as the number one team in the east to now- without those players- the team finds themselves seeded in the 6^th spot in the newly created East Division. So, it should go without saying if you’ve been around this sports-crazed city long enough, that the backlash from some fans and the press has already included mistakenly accusing Hart for the team’s inadequate defense and poor decision-making when rebuilding this year’s roster by the coach and general manager alike. 

This common practice has been proven to be detrimental in the past to fledgling goaltenders like Mason (and is well on its way to ruining Hart’s career as well): Taking a prized young prospect and rushing them to excel at the highest level, only to have them show a little bit of a promising future and then be expected to come in and immediately be the liberator to all the team’s problems that have been plaguing them for a number of years is ridiculous! This type of pressure should not be placed on a young goalie like Hart who is just 22-years-old; An age when most are just getting their start in the AHL, let alone expected to win Vezina Trophies in the NHL. These unrealistic expectations and placed on the goalie (whose numbers are quite bad) but has been left out to dry by a faulting defense in front of him could be crippling to the future development of the goaltender we have all been waiting for so long to arrive. 

Ultimately, this team’s management has failed Hart and others like him in the past! You have to protect and grow young goaltenders by giving them a defense who will provide them enough time, space, and visibility to do their jobs. Just like you would protect a young Quarterback in football with a solid offensive line: You can’t expect either to excel if you don’t give them the pieces they need to succeed. If you don’t provide them the adequate help they need you are thus setting them up to FAIL!  Just to clarify: These aren’t “nice-to-have” characteristics. These are requirements for any and all goalies to thrive. 

In order to fix all this and save Hart’s still young career before it is too late, the Flyers MUST find a way to obtain a proven NHL shutdown defenseman NOW (by any means necessary) like they had in Matt Niskanen last season (or like Mason had in Kimmo Timonen and Mark Streit) to rectify this team’s defensive breakdowns and be not only a leader on the ice but a reassuring presence to Carter moving forward. If they don’t, we could have another Steve Mason on our hands: A promising young player who once came to the team with so much potential only to leave it early as nothing more than damaged goods!