This is the Flyers, so it had to be. This had to happen at some point. The city with an out-sized personality, best known for fans stoning Santa gets the NHL coach who is the walking embodiment of punching out a police horse. John Tortorella is finally the Flyers’ coach, in what seemed like a cosmically inevitable pairing. Now one must ask: how is this going to work?
We have started an experiment of sorts, consisting of an erratic fan base, a highly pressurized coach and a hockey team that has been mostly dead for the better part of a decade. How will these three elements co-exist?
The fan base is emotional, hair triggered, and not afraid to rain their angst down on anything or anyone in their path, justified or otherwise. Tortorella, for his part, is best described as a time bomb. You know it is going to explode. It is just a matter of when, on whom, and what is left after the explosion. The team, which lately has made an art of lying down and taking beatings from fans and opponents alike, will get to see how much “help” their soft candy shell can absorb from one of the coaching ranks most demanding members.
Tortorella’s style demands maximum effort, something that has been absent from the Flyers since Jeff Carter’s heyday. As much as the lack of effort some nights irritates fans, Tortorella will feel it more so. He will take it personally, and because of this the players that dog it, will pay for it. I must admit I like that. It makes me wish Voracek and Patrick were still on the team.
Tortorella’s view on work ethic is part of the city’s ethos and something that the fan base will embrace. The smaller, less talented team, standing toe to toe with the New Yorks and DCs of the worlds, and then beating them because they were tougher, they wanted it more, because their will would not break. In the best possible case, it is the hockey version of Rocky. We could see this collection of elements morph into something special.
It is more likely that the double dose of salty from the fans and Tortorella turns into a toxic mix. These two volatile elements will feed on each other, pushing each to the extremes as the losses pile up. The Flyers players will be enveloped by this cloud, maybe smothered by it. First, it will be a player or two that Tortorella goes after. Tortorella will not be pleased with the effort, and their will be a response from the coach.
Perhaps the player is a healthy scratch, or does not play a shift after the first period, or maybe some unkind words from the coach in the press. But as always happens with Tortorella teams, it does not stop at one or two guys. At some point, Tortorella pushes the team past the tipping point, and then the jig is up.
Tortorella will demand effort, and that is good. But Tortorella will not be satisfied with the effort until the team is hoisting the Stanley Cup. This team does not have the talent to contend for a cup now, and does not appear to be on the cusp of a talent infusion. If the team plays with supreme effort and discipline each night, they can compete and even win, much like the Islanders. But there is only so much a player has to offer, and even if Tortorella gets it all, the coach will demand more. For guys that give it all every night, that type of act will get stale fast.
It could be seen as cynical, but I am not sure that the Flyers care if Tortorella is the right man for the job. The “search process” the franchise used should be viewed with skepticism. Was this a hockey decision, intended to win hockey games or was this a public relations move for a content provider?
Tortorella is click bait, he will get eyes on the organization and raise the interest level. He could bend the team into a winner, or he could turn it into a dumpster fire of Ben Simmons proportions. In either case the Flyers will have people watching, which is what matters to Comcast.