Yup, it's official. The Orange and Black have hit rock bottom. After tonight's 8-2 beating by Sidney Crosby and the Pens, it can't get any worse....can it?
In the span of five games, the Flyers have suffered embarrassing defeats of 9-1 and 8-2. The first loss resulted in the release of three veterans, the resignation of the GM and the firing of the coach. After the latest debacle, is there anything left for Mr. Snider to change to get his organ-I-zation back on track???
The most depressing thing for me is that this game once again shows that the talent gap between our young kids (Carter, Richards, Umberger, Pitkanen and Nitty) and the Pens prospects (Crosby, Malkin, Fleury, Staal, and Talbot) is absolutely humongous. As my main man Jules Winnfield would say, the two groups ain't in the same fuckin' ballpark; they ain't in the same league; shit, they ain't even playing the same fuckin' sport.
As a result, the Flyers will likely be looking up at their cross state neighbords for basically the next decade. It's a sorry realization and as a life long Flyers fan, this is a very sad evening.
How did things fall apart so fast? I haven't been able to catch most of the games so far, but it sure appears that this group of Flyers is the root of the problem. I can distinctly state that Kyle Calder adds nothing to this team. I love Sami Kapanen's heart and skating ability, but what happened to the hands of this former 40 goal scorer? Carter bewilders me. He looks like he should dominate, but it seems that he only plays hard in spurts. I really can't get a feel for Umberger or this Lars Johnsson fellow other than to say that they don't impress me a whole lot. I do kind of like Sanderson and Robitaille as third and fourth line role players, but they don't seem to mesh real well with any of the centers.
As for the defensemen, you don't have to be Scotty Bowman to realize Rathje is not a NHL defenseman any longer. Hatcher is a #6 at best if he plays with a real mobile partner. Through the first ten games, it is evident that this group of defensemen is in the bottom five of the league.
After this week's coaching and GM changes, the only thing left to do is to change the players. If the first ten games are any indication of this current group of Flyers, I'm all for whole sale changes. This group just doesn't have the heart, skill or desire to comprise a winning team in today's NHL.
Let the rebuilding process begin in earnest.
4 comments:
Will Eric Desjardins please come out of retirement?
I don't think Mike Richards will ever score again. I have never seen a guy have so many chances every game and fail to put the puck in the net every time.
Mike Richards is the new Ron Flockhart/Pat Falloon/Branko (ahahaha)...looks like he should score a ton of goals, but doesn't.
Ron Flockhart? Holy $&*#! Talk about a blast from the past.
Flockey Hockey, baby!
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