What the Hell Happened to the Flyers?

A perennial contender now looks like a pretender.

After last season, I was stoked about the future of this Philadelphia Flyers squad. Vigneault gave this team a shot in the arm by creating a culture of toughness, speed and attitude that turned this mediocre squad into the top seed in the Eastern conference.

Travis Knoecny was putting pucks behind the net at such a rapid pace, I truly believed he was the successor to Claude Giroux.

Kevin Hayes was the calm vet that brought even more leadership on this team.

Oskar Linbolm beat f**king cancer.

And then the playoffs started.

Through two series against the Canadiens and Islanders, the Flyers converted on a mere 7.7% of their man-advantages. As for the overall offensive production, that was a complete blunder. Per QuantHockey.com, NINE Flyers exited the playoff bubb;e without scoring a single goal, including leading goal-scorer Travis Knoecny and Philadelphia legend Claude Giroux.

Flash forward to 2021, as a Flyers fan, the pressure was already mounting for this team to take advantage of its championship window. The aforementioned Giroux is showing his age as he’s failed to score over 30 goals since the 2017-18 season, when he was in the top five in points across the league with 102.

Defenseman Shayne Ghostisbhere, who broke out in his rookie season with a historic output, fell off a cliff and Philadelphia only just waived him this WEEK after two disappointments of campaigns.

Anointed savior in net, Carter Hart has appeared to be a shell of himself, allowing over a goal-and-a-half more on average compared to his fantastic 2019-20 season.

However, this is more than just a few key players not living up to high expectations. As of this writing, the Flyers are tied with the Chicago Blackhawks for third worst penalty kill in the NHL at 73.6 percent.

On the powerplay, they’re not much better, just barely converting under 20 percent of their opportunities so far.

Recently, Alain Vigneault and co. dropped two games they desperately needed, a 6-1 shellacking at the hands of the Buffalo Sabres, who tied a league-record of 18 consecutive losses, and the New York Islanders, who are second in the division.

With roughly 20 games to go, the Flyers have three of their next four contests against the Bruins and five games against the New Jersey Devils, just to pick a few of the headliners that are left on the schedule.

Sitting five points out of fourth place in the division, the Flyers MUST win these three games against the Bruins to even get into the playoffs, and that will start on the defensive end. Throughout the season series between these two squads, the Flyers have played well but have blown multiple leads, which has led to me nearly punching a hole in my wall.

This team HAS the offensive talent.

This team HAS the goalie in between the pipes.

This team just NEEDS a kick in the ass and if there was any coach to ram that shoe and get his team fired up, it’s Alain Vigneault so here’s praying to the Lord himself the Flyers find a spark somewhere.

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