Paul Holmgren’s Term as GM is Still on These Flyers
Paul Holmgren was the general manager of the Philadelphia Flyers for eight years; which is the third longest tenure behind Bobby Clarke and Hall of Famer Keith Allen. Like Clarke and Allen, he helped to build a team that went to the Stanley Cup finals, but unlike Allen, they did not win. During those years, the Flyers made the playoffs in six of eight seasons at the helm. And while that is good, the seeds for the Flyers demise started with Paul Holmgren’s term. Let’s take a deeper look into what happened.
Reshuffling the Deck
First of all, Holmgren is a disciple of Clarke. And like Clarke, he was focused on building a team that was big and physical. Now, it kind of worked for Clarke. Under Clarke, the Flyers were almost always a playoff bound team loaded up with stars. However, they were usually bounced out of the playoffs by a team that they should have beaten (like a Toronto, Ottawa, Florida, Tampa, Buffalo) or the New Jersey Devils. Every year under Clarke, it felt as if they were just “one player away” from winning it all; but they never found that guy.
And much like with Clarke, it was always that they had “a bad goalie”. During Holmgren’s time as GM, the Flyers had 17 goalies: Antero Niittymaki, Robert Esche, Martin Biron, Michael Leighton, Martin Houle, Scott Munroe, Brian Boucher, Ray Emery, Johan Backlund, Jeremy Duchesne, Carter Hutton, Sebastien Caron, Sergei Bobrovsky, Ilya Bryzgalov, Jason Bacashihua, Steve Mason, and Cal Heeter. Now while some of them are forgettable, most of these guys had decent seasons. Some, like Leighton, couldn’t stay healthy, but few of these guys are what I would consider “bad”. But, much like Clarke again, sometimes the trigger was pulled too soon on some of these guys.
And also like Clarke, Holmgren perpetually put the Flyers near the salary cap. In fact, I don’t think I can remember a moment in my life that the Flyers haven’t been near the salary cap threshold. But when Holmgren resigned, it put pressure on Ron Hextall, his successor as GM, to fix the financial mess the Flyers have been in. And recently departed GM Chuck Fletcher spent the bulk of his career fixing up the mistakes that Hextall put the team in.
So, we see Holmgren making many of the same mistakes that his predecessor had. But again, we can see the thinking. The Flyers were usually “close” enough to the Stanley Cup finals. Maybe one more player could put them over the top. So, if it (sorta) worked, why change things?
But it wasn’t all bad under Holmgren. He did make some bold moves.
Acquiring Acquisitions
One thing you can say about Holmgren, he was not afraid to make a move. During his eight years as GM, he made 66 trades…on average eight a year. Now, to be fair, many of these are typical draft day deals…”We’ll trade you our fifth round this year and six round next year for your lower fourth round pick this year.”
However, he made some bold moves. A few of these deals are among the very best in Flyers history. Some of them are also on the worst deals ever made.
Among the best trades he made:
- The broken down shell of Peter Forsberg to Nashville for Ryan Parent, Scottie Upshall, and some draft picks.
- Trading away the remnants of Alexei Zhitnik for Braydon Coburn.
- Trading Nashville back their first round pick for Kimmo Timonen & Scott Hartnell.
- Somehow getting a first and third rounder for RJ Umberger and a fourth rounder.
- Getting Dan Carcillo for Upshall.
- Trading Joffrey Lupul, Lucas Sbias, two first rounders and a conditional third rounder to acquire Chris Pronger and Ryan Dingle.
- Trading away Mike Richards and Jeff Carter, in two separate deals, and getting in return: Jakub Voracek, 2011 1st rounder (Sean Couturier), 2011 3rd rounder (Nick Cousins), Wayne Simmonds, Brayden Schenn.
- Trading Kris Versteeg for the pick that became Shayne Gostisbehere.
- Sending Michael Leighton to Columbus for Steve Mason.
But he also made some clunkers:
- Trading a first rounder for Steve Eminger.
- In two separate trades, trading away Vaclav Prospal and Simon Gagne…again.
- Trading a first rounder away to get Versteeg in the first place.
- Trading a few minor prospects to land Ilya Bryzgalov. While this involved, in a way, the Richards/Carter trades, it just never worked out.
- Sergei Bobrovsky for some draft picks.
- James van Riemsdyk for Luke Schenn never panned out like it was intended. JVR became a star in Toronto while Schenn played adequately for Philly, but was never a shutdown defender.
So the Bryz trade didn’t work out. Nobody knew he was nuts. But you have to respect the boldness. Holmgren traded a lot to get Pronger, who was old by that point. But Pronger, until his injury, was a dynamic force who helped guide the Flyers to the 2010 Stanley Cup Finals. And had his career not been cut down by a concussion, they may have returned. Likewise, the Carter/Richards trades affected this team for years.
Free Agents
General managers sign lots of free agents. Some are depth pieces that we never see as they are vets still trying to make it at the AHL level. (Artem Anisimov anyone?) Some underperform. However, sometimes you strike gold.
Holmgren definitely struck gold when he signed Daniel Briere to an eight year, $52 million contract in 2007. Likewise, after the trade to acquire him, he signed Kimmo Timonen. In 2009, he signed Ian Laperriere to a three year, $3.5 million deal, which turned out to be super cheap when you look at what he did as a Flyer.
In 2011, he signed aged veteran Jaromir Jagr to a one year deal for $3.5 million. Why the Flyers never re-signed him is beyond me. He would later become an All-Star with Florida and still plays in the Czech League. However, the leadership he showed to young stars like Claude Giroux, JVR, Simmonds, and Brayden Schenn is incalculable. It’s one of the best free agent moves by Holmgren, and one of the worst in not retaining his services.
And speaking of vets, he also signed Vincent Lecavalier to a five year deal in 2013. Lecavalier spent a little more than two seasons in Philly. In his first year, he scored 20 goals but his skills declined the following year as he battled injuries. It was a bold move that didn’t pay out.
However, his boldest move was the one that didn’t happen. In 2012, Holmgren offered restricted free agent Shea Weber a monster offer sheet. It was worth 14 years for a whopping total of $110 million with a $13 million signing bonus. With Pronger out because of his concussion, Weber could’ve theoretically taken his spot.
It was assumed that Nashville wouldn’t re-sign him. The Predators did match the deal, but you have to give Holmgren credit for trying to swing for the fences. Perhaps the 2010s Flyers would’ve been different had they had Weber.
Draft Days
If there is another complaint leveled at Holmgren that really stands to merit, it is this: the man LOVED to trade away draft picks. This is another bad habit he, unfortunately, inherited from Clarke. Thanks to trades, the Flyers did not have a first or second round pick in 2008 or 2009.
As far as first round picks go, he had some good ones. He chose James Van Riemsdyk in 2007, Sean Couturier in 2011, and Scott Laughton in 2012. He also chose Luca Sbisa in 2008 and Sam Morin in 2013, however nobody could’ve seen that Morin would suffer so many injuries.
Other good picks that Holmgren made included Shayne Gostisbehere as a third rounder in 2012. Some picks were ok and, at the very least serviceable, such as Nick Cousins and Robert Hagg. However, out of the 43 picks he selected, 20 never saw the NHL. That’s a rather high number.
Not every draft pick is going to become a star, however, it’s great to have depth, in players like Cousins and Hagg. If half of them never even reach the NHL, that’s not successful. When you temper that with the fact that in two seasons there were no first or second rounders and that JVR and Sbisa were traded away very earlier in their careers, Holmgren didn’t really have anything to show of substance for his first four drafts. However, we can also see the Couturier and Laughton are still on the team and have given Philly a decade of stability.
Conclusion
Holmgren’s tenure comes with a mixed legacy. On the one hand, acquiring Simmonds, Hartnell, Briere, Pronger and others were bold moves that helped make the team strong and competitive. Some of these moves helped propel the Flyers to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2010.
However, there was a lot of short term thinking too. Draft picks were traded away for little in return many of the time. The constant goalie turnover did not provide a stable back end. Bryzgalov turned into a disaster. Trading away a future Vezina Trophy winner in Bobrovksy looks foolish now as did trading away budding star van Riemsdyk.
At the same time, some of the contracts that were signed, Lecavalier’s for example, kept the Flyers without a lot of room to maneuver. And while it was great to see Holmgren lock up Flyers stars like Giroux, Simmonds, and others to long term expensive deals in order to build a long term core of guys, it would hamper what this team could do in the future. When Hextall did the same, it put the Flyers into the salary cap mess we find them in now.
Holmgren put together a strong team. And in many ways, I would gladly take what he did with the Flyers over what has happened over the last few years with Fletcher. But with that said, he, like Clarke before him, made a lot of moves that greatly affected how this team performed. Losing draft picks, trading young players for older vets, and overpaying talent would eventually come to haunt this team. It’s nice to imagine what would’ve, could’ve happened had Weber become a Flyer, but since it didn’t happen, it’s a moot point. You can’t cheer and celebrate what didn’t happen.
Without a clear vision over the last few years, it’s easy to see how the Flyers have become kind of a mess. A once proud and dominant franchise has become an afterthought in recent years. Hopefully new general manager Briere can change that and right the ship before it is too late. Hopefully Briere can learn from the mistakes of the Flyers past general managers, from Clarke up through Fletcher, and turn this team around.