Flyers’ General Manager Chuck Fletcher appears to be off to an early start this off season by taking care of some things in-house, but is he making the right moves? After a botched season that was full of nothing but excuses from Fletcher, the team’s head coach Alain Vigneault, and chairman David Scott of Comcast Spectacor, most fans would agree that this time around Fletcher needs to put up or shut up. Blaming everything from Canada, to COVID, to limited practice time, the organization simply didn’t seem to have the answers that 16 other playoff-bound teams did who were forced to deal with the same problems. Chuck was hired to replace Ron Hextall all the way back on December 3rd, 2018. To date, the only major piece he has brought in to personalize this team has been Kevin Hayes, who was viewed as more of a way to please Vigneault then anything (seeing that Hayes played for him previously). Since then, Chuck has essentially kept this roster the same as when he was handed it. He made a nice attempt when he brought in veteran defenseman Matt Niskanen via a trade with the Washington Capitals, but he essentially gave up the only player on the Flyers’ roster with any sense of physicality in Radko Gudas to do so. But since then, Niskanen decided to retire a year early and Chuck failed to replace him: With a wealth of talented right-hand-shot defenseman out there on the free agent market Fletcher could not convince one of them to sign with the organization this past off season. So, in turn he re-signed an aging Justin Braun and vastly overpaid left-hand-shot defenseman Erik Gustafsson to join his club and we all know how that decision turned out.
Regardless, fans don’t want to settle for hearing another statement made about Chuck after next season like this one made by Dave Scott at the team’s exit interviews after getting asked “Were you disappointed with what he did in the offseason and how things transpired?”: “I wouldn’t say disappointed. I could tell you it wasn’t a lack of effort. There were a lot of conversations with different teams, trying to get some things done. We weren’t able to get everything done that we would have liked to gotten done. Matt Niskanen left a big hole and we weren’t able to fill that hole. I can tell you it wasn’t a lack of effort on Chuck’s part”.
With that being said, let’s take a look at some of the moves made by Chuck so far this off season. First up was signing the team’s goaltending prospect Samuel Ersson which was announced back on June 3rd. Drafted back in 2018 in the 5th round by then gm Ron Hextall, Ersson has spent the past two seasons playing in his home country of Sweden’s top professional league the SHL. His stats are quite skewed though, seeing that he was the only bright spot, on a subpar team. This past season Sam played in 42 games where he achieved a record of just 16-26-0 while managing to maintain a 2.96 goals-against-average (GAA) and a .911 save percentage (SV%). Currently, Ersson is 21 years old and stands at 6’2, 176 pounds. Playing for such a bad team this past season shouldn’t be viewed as a bad thing though: On the contrary, having to deal with countless turnovers, breakaways and opposing players left alone in front of the net is nothing new for this netminder. In fact, Ersson has now developed quite a calming presence when these things happen which is a trait that should come in handy now that he will be forced to be a backstop within the Flyers’ organization. Signing a 3-year entry level deal Ersson will now finally have his chance to prove his worth stateside.
The reason for the next decision that Chuck Fletcher was forced to make recently came as a bit of a surprise. Back on May 18th the team announced that they had mutually agreed to part ways with their American Hockey League affiliate the Lehigh Valley Phantoms’ head coach Scott Gordon. Additionally, the Phantoms assistant coach Kerry Huffman stepped down as well. This came after the two managed to coach their team to a 2nd place finish in the Northern Division this year with a record of 18-7-4. If this decision was because Scott Gordon wanted out to pursue other options, like possibly an NHL-level position, then good for him. However, what his dismissal currently looks like is a way for the team to present Flyers assistant coach Ian Laperrière (Lappy) with a glorified demotion! Laperrière was named the next head coach of the Phantoms on June 6th and it is a role that this writer thinks he is better suited for. Ian started his coaching career after deciding to hang up his skates for the last time as a result of experiencing some nagging post-concussion syndromes from when he kept having to choose to sacrifice his body by taking two pucks to the face the season prior to his retirement. Once officially retired, Ian was named director of player development for the Flyers- a role that he excelled in. Laperrière was always a leader in the locker room and now embraced this new role of helping develop the team’s youth. He did so well with this he was later named an assistant coach with the Flyers where he was assigned to manage the team’s penalty killing unit. What seemed like it should be an obvious match seeing that it was a role that Lappy thrived in as a player unfortunately did not turn out so well with the Flyers being ranked among the bottom of the barrel in penalty killing for multiple years under his tenure. This season Laperrière was relegated to serve as the team’s pre-scouting coach and observed games from the press box most of the time which was quite the step down from being a bench boss. You can now see why I referenced his being named as the Phantoms’ head coach a glorified demotion.
Next up we had the peculiar re-signing of goaltender Felix Sandström. On June 8th the team announced that they would be bringing back goaltender Felix Sandström next season on a one-year two-way contract. This comes less than 24 hours after the goaltender had made it known that he recently agreed to a one-year deal to play in Finland’s top professional league the Liiga for TPS. Sandström, who was drafted back in 2015 in the 3rd round by the Flyers, has struggled since bringing his game to North America. In 11 games played last season for the Phantoms, Felix managed win just five games and posted a 3.19 GAA and a .903 SV%. The season before that Sandström was forced to play most of the season in the East Coast Hockey League (ECHL)- a step down from the AHL. Once thought to be the guy to challenge Carter Hart. he now seems stuck in his development. The large part of this being that there simply isn’t enough time in net to go around. The only good thing with the team deciding to sign Ersson and Sandström this off season to join Ustimenko is that there hopefully will be no need to re-sign goalie Alex Lyon next season.
The team’s latest move was choosing to bring back both German Rubtsov and Linus Sandin, a move that isn’t one that fans should be completely excited about. The now 22-year-old Rubtsov was drafted in the 1st round in the 2016 draft and has been quite the disappointment to say the least. Once thought to be a dominant puck possessor with a great ability to distribute the puck when drafted, the Flyers later found that excelling at juniors may have been his ceiling. Once turning pro, German failed to grow his game; In fact, at times when called up to the NHL Rubtsov looked timid- shying away from puck battles along the boards and putting on the breaks when seeing that an opposing player had him lined up for a hit. The organization was so displeased with his play that this past season they decided to loan German to the HK Sochi of the KHL with the hopes that returning to his native country would help him get his game back on track. Rubtsov managed to score just three goals and eight assists for 11 points in 46 games played this year while playing in the KHL. In that time German averaged a -11 on the year, which is why this signing in particular leaves this writer scratching his head given all the current depth at the center position that is already signed and in the system already. With names like Morgan Frost, Connor Bunnaman, Tanner Laczynski, Zayde Wisdom, Tyson Foerster, and Jackson Cates why do they need him? And, if they wanted to add another, why wouldn’t the team choose to sign their 2018 1st round pick center Jay O’Brien instead who averaged a point-per-game this year in the NCAA playing for Boston University.
Linus Sandin on the other hand was a shot-in-the-dark signing last off season who looked promising given the fact that in the ‘19-‘20 season while playing in Sweden’s top professional league, the SHL, he was among the league’s leaders in goals with 19. This past season while playing for the Phantoms he managed to score just 6 in 26 games played and was a -8 on the season. I don’t know about you but I’m willing to accept that management was willing to offer him another year seeing that the team’s depth chart at right wing is lacking right now. Draft picks Bobby Brink, Connor McClennon, and Bryce Brodzinski are all at least a year away from being ready to joining the pro ranks.
To sum it up, although Chuck’s early moves seem to be mostly focused on some basic housekeeping by re-signing failed prospects, signing ones that were already drafted before he came here, and being too scared to outright fire an inadequate coach, it leads this writer to be fearful of the moves (or lack thereof) to come once free agency occurs. I hope after reading this you may be as well. Before being hired, Fletcher knew why he was being brought in and why his predecessor was let go. But while he was given his orders Chuck has seemingly continued along the same path as Hextall by making some good draft choices but having done very little in the way of trying to better the NHL club moving forward. I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of the excuses! I’m tired of hearing “well it wasn’t for us not trying”. This fan base deserves a playoff team and the only way to ensure that is for the general manager to once again take risk, derailing from this haggard way of thinking that the team has been built on for some time now to create a culture shock. By making a big move to try and better this team now. By bringing in a fresh face (or two) who are not already comfortable in the mediocrity that currently surrounds the team and who will strive to lead this team out of that dark cloud that they are presently in and remind them once again how to play this game the right way. They have to stop filling up roster spots by re-signing the same old familiar faces that, over time, haven’t worked and bring in some new ones once free agency begins.
He’s been horrible. The coaching staff has been horrible. The players have been horrible.
When’s the last time the Philadelphia Brought in big-name players no one wants to come to Philly Look at New York Boston Toronto Edmonton Chicago And so on these teams go after high scoring free agents top defenseman Philadelphia goes after has been defenseman and time after time the players they do trade go on to win Stanley cups with other teams and go on to have great careers it seems to me that it’s the organization that’s failing not the players