Flyers Playoff Player Review: Claude Giroux

The scoring bug that plagued the Flyers found its way to Claude Giroux as well.

Another Flyers playoff year, and another set of games where we wonder if Claude Giroux will ever score. This is how things have gone for Giroux and the Flyers for the past five years.  At this point I am beginning to think the problem is me, not Giroux.

For those not keeping track, Giroux has exactly 4 goals in his last 35 playoff games, dating back to the 2014 playoffs.

In the 2020 playoffs Giroux collected 8 points, one goal, in the 16 playoff games he played. This  was good enough for fifth best amongst Flyers’ forwards and tied him for fifth on the team overall.

For a regular player these would not be bad numbers, but this is Claude Giroux. The offense has been built around, truly more built by, G for years and it seems reasonable to expect that to continue in the post season. Given recent history, maybe it is not so reasonable.

The advanced metrics were good to Giroux, who was paired mostly with Couturier and Voracek.  Giroux would finish third in corsi percentage with a robust 56.96%. He was only surpassed by his line mates. Giroux also had a plus 3 even strength goal differential.

This is a decent enough number, but with such strong corsi numbers and Carter Hart goosing everyone’s goals against I would have expected to see a bigger gap.

Giroux struggled on the powerplay, like the rest of the team. In what was an absolutely putrid display of using the man advantage, the Flyers only managed four goals in the entire playoffs.  On the bright side Giroux collected an assist on three of the four goals.

I am not sure how much blame can be shouldered by Giroux, as the coaching staff never really seemed to come up with an alternative game plan. They just kept trying the same thing that had not worked for the previous 10 games.  But what can’t be put on the coaches must fall at the feet of the team’s captain and best offensive player.

As a leader and as a scorer, when things are going this badly, the responsibility falls on Giroux to find a way, invent a way, to get pucks in the net.  In this Giroux fell short, and given his position on the team, most of the blame must go to him.

Giroux’s inability to produce offensively and especially on the power play, are the main factors in the Flyers’ failure against New York. The team’s, and Giroux’s, inability to make the Islanders pay for taking penalties was the difference in the series.

Much like was the case for Travis Konecny, Giroux is a victim of his stature and role on the team.  Giroux won nearly every shift he played.  He committed few costly mistakes, and he made the little plays that helped his line dominate possession.

But as the premier offensive option, one of the greatest offensive players in the history of the franchise, one goal is not going to cut it.  Four powerplay goals in 16 games is not going to cut it, not for the best half wall player on earth.

I expected a lot more from Giroux, as I have for years, and each time I am disappointed.  Giroux has spent much of his career and all of his prime, making something out of nothing.  Most of the teams he played on were fatally flawed in the kindest light, steaming piles of hot garbage in real talk, and Giroux made them all better.

He dragged teams of lesser players to successes they had no right to taste, but now, in the playoffs, it seems even beyond the powers of great Giroux to make anything.

In a playoff year where the Flyers had depth scoring, solid defense, and goaltending  Giroux’s continued playoff struggles were so hard to endure and bitterly frustrating.  I can’t imagine how Giroux feels.  This playoff year has changed my relationship with Giroux, and it makes me sad.

I can no longer expect him to fill the scoresheet. He has proven this to me time and time again. I will not expect him to put up a point a game, I won’t even ask him to. I don’t know how the Flyers will score in this season’s playoffs, but for the first time in a decade I will not put the (unfair) offensive expectations on the back of Giroux.  This season I will see him as a just player, not as G, and all that has come to mean.