Joel Farabee’s last benching was on a Thursday night after just playing two shifts, totaling :56 minutes of ice time against the New Jersey Devils in December of 2023. Farabee did not leg out the first New Jersey goal, while not giving maximum effort to back check. Flyers’ Head Coach John Tortorella said that he “Didn’t listen” following the game, insisting that he has discussed giving max effort previously with the club before this recent incident took place.
Since then, Farabee continues his iron man streak of playing in 216 straight games, until his benching tonight against the Anaheim Ducks.
One thing should do is give Joel Farabee kudos for handling this benching with class. He could of threw his hands in the air, pouted, or just remained mad. However, Farabee will sit in the press box cheering on his teammates.
He has had an up and down 2024-25 season accumulating just 14 points and 42 games played, but there was a sense of frustrations at times after a dry spell of points. Farabee is a perfectionist and he knows his craft well, so when he can’t perform at a level he knows he can play at, a sense of frustrations obviously ensue. In the same token he has played well defensively, and that has actually kept him from being scratched until tonight.
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Farabee plays a 200 foot game, and he is just so darn good at killing penalties. It becomes very attractive to stay up with the big club for good, based off those reasons alone. Killing penalties is a crucial attribute to have, and Farabee does it well. Obviously, John Tortorella thinks he should be producing offensively, as well.
“Up until the last couple weeks I really liked his game. He was involved in the offense, unfortunately, he doesn’t score, sometimes he fed doesn’t score. But, the past couple weeks his game has gotten stale,” Flyers’ Head Coach John Tortorella said today at Morning Skate.
What Farabee also brings is skating, and typically you know if he is a confident player with the way he skates. Farabee can skate at top speeds to push the play up the ice. He’s proven time and time again he is an excellent skater, with the agility and edge work to get by defenders in one-on-one situations, and he also possesses a great first step. Farabee is an outstanding playmaker off the wing, who possesses great vision of the ice.
It’s clear the Flyers need him, and I think he will be just fine. He will learn from this, and he will put this recent incident in the rear view mirror.
Flyers lineup updates:
Joel Farabee out, Olle Lycksell in
Samuel Ersson in goal
Cutter Gauthier us in town tonight:
