The Philadelphia Flyers are one of the more historic teams in the NHL. They rose to prominence and took the league by storm as they beat and battered their opponents on their way to becoming Stanley Cup Champions. Their physicality earned them the moniker, "The Broad Street Bullies".
As the Bully Era died down around 1980, other teams began getting physical too, seeing the success it brought the Flyers. Soon, being tough was a league standard. And throughout the 80s and 90s, the team had its fair share of tough guys you didn't want to mess with. Gone were Dave Schultz and Don Saleski. Now, there were guys like Rick Tocchet, Craig Berube, Kjell Samuelsson, Donald Brashear, Rod Brind'Amour, Luke Richardson, and Eric Lindros.
After the 2004 lockout, rule changes were implemented, taking away a lot of the need for brute physicality. Still, the Flyers had some guys who were good at fighting (Zac Rinaldo) or could do a bit of both: being physical and scoring goals (Wayne Simmonds). We've been treated to a lot of roughhousing over the last few seasons with Nicolas Deslauriers and Garnet Hathaway.
However, both Deslauriers and Hathaway are gone. The Flyers traded for Simon Benoit this summer, but he seems more like a guy they bring up for special situations (or if a lot of people get hurt) since he mainly hits and is a HUGE defensive liability. You could say there is Nikita Grebenkin, who is recovering from injury and probably better than just being a bruiser, as he looks as if he could have a bit of Rick Tocchet in him. Could a fourth scoring line, centered by Sean Couturier, make the other teams a little more unsettled? Could Couturier become more of a Jordan Staal and command a solid bottom line that can score, but play a defensive game as well?
So now what? Where do we go from here? Are we morphing into a team that is becoming more reliant on speed and youth? Could we build four scoring lines instead of just being built for brawn and size? After all, that seems to be the way Carolina did it, and they are the reigning champions.
I love doling out big hits and being physical. However, we saw that being big isn't everything. The '97 Flyers, who pummeled their way through the Eastern Conference, were humiliated by a Red Wings team in the Stanley Cup Finals because they could outskate and outskill them. You can't hit what you can't catch. Teams are getting faster now. Perhaps focusing on speedy snipers, as opposed to brute strength, could be a better way to go.
Who knows what the final roster will look like. However, this does seem to be an intriguing development. Bobby Clarke, as GM, spent the better part of 15 years trying to rebuild his beloved Bullies in the early 90s to mid-'00s, only to see it fail as younger, faster teams could evade the hulking Flyers. Maybe this is a new step Daniel Briere, Keith Jones, and Tocchet have in mind. Maybe this is a new-look Flyers team for a new Flyers era. We'll find out soon enough.
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