The New Unending Flyers thread

Well, now it sounds like Briere's move to permanent GM is all but inevitable. The bigger change is now you have an ownership group that is ready to rebuild, and, it's hinted, sweep out the old guard. He's basically talking like he has the job already, including keeping Flahr as his assistant.

Per multiple team sources, he’s the heavy favorite to get it.

Brière checks a number of boxes for ownership, after all. First, he has a strong working relationship with John Tortorella, who the organization very much wants to keep. Second, he’s viewed both internally and externally as an intelligent hockey mind — he made it to the final round of interviews for the GM position in Montreal just last year. And finally, he has a strong relationship with the business side of the organization, having been their hire first to manage the Maine Mariners of the ECHL.

Feels like a press release but that's okay (inasmuch as the company understands how important it is to put this sort of message out there).

It's also so typical of Hayes to get something (probably) so wrong, either because he just misses things or because as a general columnist he doesn't follow the team closely enough. I do think any time you get a new GM the incumbent coach may not survive in the long run but the early indication is Briere and Torts get along, Scott probably still has the coach's back for now as well.

To their delight Fletcher in the following spring hired old-school coach Alain Vigneault, which was unwise. After Vigneault’s inevitable firing three seasons later, he hired Clarke and Holmgren favorite John Tortorella, which has been even less wise.

Will this last? Brière is a mini-computer geek and the most analytics-friendly executive the club has had. Tortorella carries a rusty abacus and says, “Most analytics are trash.” Hmm.

Well it certainly took the Phillies a long time to get to that point. Bowa was only forced out when Kapler became manager and Charlie still managed to become the hitting coach during that time. And I would say Gillick remains influential (and, I believe, still has his tiny ownership share) but less so now that Dombrowski is here. He certainly recommended MacPhail (and MacPhail actually did play a key role in recruiting Dombrowski and was still allowed to run that entire search, easy to forget that now!)

I think Barber's influence is actually the most shocking thing. Apparently he has been Scott's most trusted guy in that role behind the scenes (whereas Clarke and Holmgren's influence was always explicit).

What's dumb is Briere really is just Hextall 2.0, part insider, part outsider, younger and less experienced than Hextall but not necessarily a out-of-nowhere person. Obviously Hextall had his shortcomings but we also know he wasn't truly allowed to do his job, and was forced out in part for not sucking up to that trio... so now we're hoping they will finally do what they should have in the first place.

They seem to place some value on simply playing games that matter (and more ice time too) even though it's a lower level. Plus, what if they help the Flyers win?

Works out good for you. Though I think I would have gone to Allentown today.

Wowza. I really thought the fact that they didn't just do it when Hilferty got hired (a mere month ago) meant it wouldn't happen for another year or two. I wonder if he made the decision himself or if the fallout (and continued agita about the old-guard advisors, particularly Barber who was apparently the most hands-on and closest to Scott) forced his hand.

I'd say that President of hockey operations hire is more important than ever though. Hilferty's a power player in Philly (and he's also the World Cup chair) kind of like David Cohen was but I think I would have preferred to see the NHL governor role go to that person or Camillo.

I guess it is probably a positive that Hilferty is a lifelong Flyers fan. Will be very interesting to see what they do with the President job, and who else actually does get swept out.