The Ended Flyers Thread

[xogfog]

They never should have fired Hextall. His plan would have paid off if given the time and they let him do what he wanted. The problem of requiring him team keep the team competitive flies in the face of his plan because if you don't "tank" you don't get high enough draft picks to properly rebuild the team. So, it was managements fault in that they would rather be mediocre than build a winner. They thought that they would lose fans if they were bad for a few years is a false premise, Flyer fans are the most loyal fans there are. So, it showed that they would rather make money than build a championship team. It also didn't help that they won the 2nd overall pick in the draft lottery in a weak draft year.

[LegoDoom]

They never should have fired Hextall.

Agreed.

[VoteForKalas]

AIR, Hextall was fired for being a bit of a control freak that stepped on the toes of former the Flyers establishment. He had a plan that needed a five year run. His draft was aimed at rebuilding the club from the goal out. The on ice product was to be made to be competitive by adding FAs to strengthen the roster that had some good established players in it. His HC was player development guy who had had good luck working with young players at ND.
The plan failed. Hakstol's systems of play were seen by some as being too elementary for the NHL. The FAs that he signed didn't fill in the holes in the roster very well. Some potential trades were turned down by Hextall which didn't jibe with his rebuilding plan. His drafting didn't create instant NHL players. When asked to devote from his plan, he refused so he was let go. It wasn't the prettiest of Flyer eras but it sure beat the pants off of what Vigneault did to the club over the last two years.

Your points about Hextall are legit. He did try to control the process as much as possible and keep folks in upper mgmt and ownership from interfering or short cutting his plan. Unfortunately, that is what ultimately happened and Hextall did respond with a refusal to change the plan.

I think there probably was resentment from TPTB with Hextall's stubborness and inflexibility that may have even gone beyond their dislike of how his plan was developing. Being a GM is quite difficult; on one hand you have to believe in your strategy and work toward implementing/sustaining it, but it does help to collaborate with others and recruit them to aid you in your plan. The Flyers stated, after letting him go, that they preferred a GM "with a bias for action". That, to me, always meant more moves to improve the NHL roster and performance even if it impacted the rebuild.

I have not heard much of what Hextall has done so far in Pittsburgh, but the fact the Penguins just got sold to the Fenway Group does raise the potential for more change.

[zambonir]

A lot of what was said about Klentak was said about Hextall, particularly their inability or unwillingness to suck up to or take the counsel of the old-timers. Obviously Hextall had a lot more experience and a much clearer plan than Klentak did, but the fundamentals of the situations weren't that different either really - not going all-in on the tank (both before and during the rebuild) combined with poor talent acquisition combined with a premature desire to win again. In both cases the GMs were more patient than the owners.

[schillingfan]

Problem with the Phillies is you can’t acquire a Bryce Harper and then be patient. You are wasting his primo years. That is particularly true now with Wheeler and Realmuto. If you can’t build a winning team, then trade them now.

[zambonir]

Well that's absolutely true now. But there's no evidence that the team was really ready to win when they signed Harper and Realmuto and Cutch (and acquired Segura). The Flyers, OTOH, already had all their star players in hand. But once Hexy signed JVR he pretty much gave up his window to be patient, as did Klentak in '19.

[xogfog]

I can't hellp but wonder though if Hextall wanted to lay out big contracts to free agents, or was told he had to make those moves to "keep fans in the seats". I believe that Hextall knew the only way to fix it was to tank and stock up in the draft, but management would not allow that.

[Philsmania]

It should also be pointed out that while Hextall got experience in other organizations, his professional hockey and front office careers were born and raised in "The Flyers Way", so it wouldn't surprise me if he bought into the "we don't rebuild" mentality.

[VoteForKalas]

I can't hellp but wonder though if Hextall wanted to lay out big contracts to free agents, or was told he had to make those moves to "keep fans in the seats". I believe that Hextall knew the only way to fix it was to tank and stock up in the draft, but management would not allow that.

I think you're correct and much of the proof comes from his involvement in the King FO that rebuilt that team from scratch and won 2 Cups with a strong vet core (Kopitar, Brown, Williams) + talented youth (Doughty, Quick, Martinez) + good trades (Richards, Carter).

Hextall was trying to replicate that type of process - he had a fairly good vet core, but needed a large talented youth injection and some good trades to fill gaps. The talent was on its way with Hart, Konecny, Provorov, Sanheim, Farabee, Lindholm etc., but the core was aging and his trades were mostly to fortify the bottom 6 with mixed success.

Due to some of his own mistakes and the Flyers impatience, his time ran out before the rewards could be fully realized and now it may never be, similar to the 76ers unfortunately with their own stupid firing of Hinkie and hiring of the Colangelo clown show that pretty much doomed the process.

[zambonir]

So does anyone think hiring Rick Tocchet is a good idea? I know he was a respected assistant and the Coyotes were a mess, but if his name was Joe Smith it would not be much of a track record, and because he's Rick Tocchet it really feels like it would be a trip back to the Clarke front office.

[VoteForKalas]

So does anyone think hiring Rick Tocchet is a good idea? I know he was a respected assistant and the Coyotes were a mess, but if his name was Joe Smith it would not be much of a track record, and because he's Rick Tocchet it really feels like it would be a trip back to the Clarke front office.

Tocchet is my favorite Flyer player of all time, but as a head coach he has been pretty abysmal. Even as an assistant coach, he has struggled outside of two years in Pittsburgh when they won the Cup.

He has bounced around quite a bit with gaps in the resume - Colorado, Phoenix, gap pleading guilty to gambling charges, reinstated by the NHL, TB assistant, TB head coach for 1 year, gap, Pittsburgh assistant, won two Cups, Arizona head coach for 3 years, let go at end of the 2020-21 season.

I've never got a sense of his coaching philosophy or expectations for his players. I think he is seen as more of a player coach. It would be a typical Flyers move to hire Tocchet, bringing a fan favorite back like they did with Barber, but I do not think it would work. Fletcher is likely out soon if the team does not turn it around significantly and so we'd again have a head coach working under a new GM they did not hire. They probably should have grabbed Sutter before he went to Calgary, but they may have thought he was too much like Vigneault.

[bigegypt0417]

Flyers have won 3 games in a row...they are still a mess but they seem to be playing a little better.

[VoteForKalas]

Agreed, although it is pretty normal for a short term bounce after a coaching change. Especially, if Vigneault was as unpopular and Yeo as respected as reported.

Let's see how January goes and whether Yeo can keep this rolling or if the gremlins will re-emerge.

[zambonir]

Yeo took over the Blues in mid-2017 and did great, but still managed to get fired one year later (after which time they won the Cup under Berube. Kind of the sidenote to this era, that both Laviolette and Berube got to finals with other teams).

He's Fletcher's guy from St. Paul so he surely has a better chance of keeping the job than Gordon did but not sure any of it matters. There just seemed to be a an early sense in the media that Yeo might not even remain the head coach in-season (which is how Tocchet's name got thrown around).

[Aquapong]

Was just at a Hershey Bears game on Sunday against the Laval Rocket and saw Primeau in net that game. Apparently he was called up.

[Aquapong]

Points in 6 straight and we’re back in the hunt. It’s a long season. They do need to fix the shot count imbalance though. They are spending too much time in their zone and not enough in the O zone.

[bigegypt0417]

Listening to Bobby clarke killing Hextall about how he made decisions on draft picks points to why this organization is where it is...none of the scouts wanted Nolan Patrick but wanted Makar...that is just one example.

https://twitter.com/andystrickland/status/1480930459282550787?t=UvJ1-em1FogWopKud4aL5g&s=19

[Docs]

My memory of the 2017 draft was that it was a two player draft - suggesting that the flyers wanted anyone else at 2 seems like revisionist history. And they also rag on Hextall for the Scheen trade in this interview. The flyers drafted Farabee and Frost with those two picks they got for Scheen. How is that a terrible trade for the flyers?

[zambonir]

Yeah, ironically they would have been better off picking lower but hard say it was a bad pick at the time (and hard for me to believe that Hextall really made that call without any scouts, and especially not Chris Pryor, at least on board a little). People would have gone nuts had they taken one of the d-men (or not traded down to do it). And who knows what Patrick might have become with better health - or with a better franchise.

Mostly this just feels like Clarke trying to advance the (false) narrative that it's okay he and Holmgren run things again now, because Hexy was no better.

[VoteForKalas]

Nolan Patrick was absolutely one of the top 2 picks in that draft, consensus choice by almost every respected resource in the hockey world.

Hextall would have gotten raked over the coals if he had not taken one of the two top choices. Since we selected 2nd, that meant whoever the Devils did not take, either Hischier or Patrick. Hischier has definitely not lit the league on fire either.

Clarke is such a jerk. He was a horrible GM for the Flyers and was instrumental in inculcating this destructive organization approach of doing everything to compete every year. Hextall was trying to build something that could last. I love Clarke as a player and captain, but he is such a narrow minded broken record.