(slight disclaimer: although I am a Sharks fan, I do follow the Flyers since they are my “home” team)
Bobby Clarke must have a filing cabinet full of incriminating photos of people, because there is no possible explanation for his continued employment as an NHL general manager.
Ranger fans, bring your sugar packets! Red Wing fans, stop by after the parade! Let’s pile on!
Now then–how has he screwed up? Let us count the ways.
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The Flyers have had HOW many coaches in the past few years? Good God, how can any team have any kind of cohesiveness when there is a new coach every fricken year? Oh, and I’m sure Roger Nielsen appreciated your remarks about getting cancer.
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Useless trades–remind me again why you bothered to acquire expensive players at a high cost and then prompty get rid of them. Prime example–Adam Oates. Played 19 games for the Flyers, cost them their best goalie prospect and several draft picks, won’t be resigned. Or how about Chris Gratton? He eventually ended up getting traded back to Tampa for the same guy (Mikael Renberg) that the Flyers sent there to begin with! Jiri Dopita was also recently dumped to Edmonton for a third round pick. Whoop dee.
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Bungling the Lindros situation–Granted, Eric Lindros and his parents are titanic assholes. But Clarke was really no better in this situation. It didn’t have to end the way it did.
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Bungling free agent signings–Let’s see. A couple years back, the Flyers had pretty much their pick of big free agent goalies. So who do they get? An aging John Vanbiesbrouck. It’s probably a stretch to say they could have gotten hometown boy Mike Richter. But even then, most everyone wished they would have gone after Curtis Joseph a little more.
Now, it comes up again. Roman Cechmanek was erratic for most of last season, and downright quit in the playoffs. Brian Boucher was traded recently for a backup goalie and a mediocre center. Guess who’s a free agent this year? Curtis Joseph, and recently let go Ed Belfour, whose coach just happens to be the new coach in Philly. So, is Clarke going after anyone? Nope.
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Spectacular playoff failures–Remember when the Red Wings kicked the Flyers’ ass in the finals, and the coach said his players “choked”? Remember blowing a 3-1 lead to New Jersey? Remember scoring all of what, 2 goals against Ottawa? Remember the 8-0 smackdown at the hands of the Sabres? The Flyers are one of the most piss-poor playoff teams in recent years.
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How about the basic philosophy of the game? Bobby–it’s not 1975 anymore. Speed, not goons, is what wins these days. Clarke’s irrational disdain for European players has stupidly sent away a lot of talent from this team, so they could be the same big, slow, North American bunch of guys that won Stanley Cups 20 years ago.
Damn, I wish I was in Philly this week. I bet WIP is having a field day with the last week or so of idiocy. If the Flyers ever think they are going to do anything, Clarke needs to be fired, post-haste.