Excellent article and analysis, Charlie.

Re controlled entries – even when they do carry it in, they often end up taking the puck behind the net and trying to cycle it anyway, as opposed to creating offense immediately. Under Torts, they would use their skills a little more to try to make plays happen – they are a lot more conservative on that front with Tocchet.

And second, it isnt all that impressive to be a sound defensive team when you are playing conservative offense and focusing on defense. The trick is to play sound defensive structure AND still be able to pop on offense – that means trusting the skill players to do their thing (which, surprisingly, Torts did to some degree – as long as they didnt cheat too much in the defensive zone, he let TK & Michkov be creative).

I really dont think this system plays to Michkov’s strengths – his magic is in the open ice when he is moving with the puck and can use his vision to set up others or take a shot. Forcing him to play along the boards and make plays with a defensive player on top of him is a waste of his talents.

For the first time in 35+ years of being a hockey fan, i am writing off a coach as being eminently unsuitable for this team at this stage in its rebuild. This is a system you would accept if you were a second tier playoff team and wanted to make a deep playoff run – right now, they should be focused on developing the players.

For example, is it my imagination or is Drysdale is starting to look a lot more assertive in the offensive zone of late? Give him the freedom to create, even if he makes a few mistakes – we don’t need another 30-point Dman who can get the puck out of the zone well. We need a 50-point PP QB who can make things happen in the offensive zone. Drysdale has the talent for that – you can see flashes of it. Develop that!

Also, fk Gauthier.

I can kinda/sorta understand a prospect telling a team he doesnt want to play for them (like Lindros with the Nordiques) – it is a business after all. But when you commit to playing for a team and they spend high draft resources on you, and you dont even MEET the team management that has flown out to talk to you? That’s just entitled POS behavior and i will always root against him and his NHL career.

And this isnt so much about him rejecting the Flyers, but his behavior. This extreme level of self-entitlement doesnt belong in hockey, the quintessential team sport.

Excellent article, Charlie.

Very much enjoy the breakdown and the analytics … I think his preferred offensive system makes sense in terms of shot quality and more possession time . As I was reading though I kept thinking about the PP thru 3 coaches, different assistant coaches has been poorest in the league for 5 years . More talent naturally will improve that

He is installing his system defensively it seems successfully and as talent upfront ( hopefully improves ) whatever offensive system any team has will improve naturally . Their best two hopes in talent ( Michkov and Martone ) are not ever going to be high end skaters. I think puck possession offense will benefit them more than say Torts year 2 system. They don’t have speed up the middle or upfront overall to play differently. His concepts make sense to me especially based on the current roster construction and their best pieces going forward.

Side note if Luchanko is at worst middle 6 center his speed is sorely needed

The Flyers are ranked higher in actual goals than expected goals. The players are being held back! (Half sarcastic).The talent is there.

What a valuable article (and one of the reasons when Charlie joined PHLY, so did I as a Diehard)!

One question: hope I’m not misinterpreting his comments, but on yesterday’s podcast Charlie observed Gauthier expressed an interest in joining the Flyers and later embraced the opposite stance. It’s as if the Flyers were a black box with no impact on Gauthier’s decision calculus. I only wish our intelligence agencies were as leak-proof regarding factors underpinning the trajectory of Gauthier’s attitude toward Philadelphia. It’s with bitter irony one of the few “non-reach” first round selections from the Flahr regime has developed into a likely 40-goal scorer for another team.

Great piece, Charlie.

Basically, the strengths of the players don’t match the system, and the system also needs better players.

Color me not optimistic.

Good in depth analysis. A little bit unfair context on Tocchet’s history. Arizona was never a top talent team, especially offensively. And organizationally they were mess that only got fixed with their later move to Utah.. He got them to be competitive. In Vancouver, the year they did well, he helped in the continued development of Quinn Hughes who won the Norris that year. And his best offensive forward gets injured in the middle of the year, right after signing a huge contract extension, and has never been the same since. The Flyers, including power play goals, have averaged 2022-2023 2.7 goals/game, 2023-2024, 2.8 goals/game, 2024-2025, 2.9 goals/game and this year, through 68 games, 2.9 goals/game.

Going beyond the stats, something that caught my attention was Joel Quenneville’s post-game conference. He highlighted how the Flyers play a physical game that doesn’t on skill or clean execution. His assessment is accurate, and it paints a picture where the Flyers may be reverting to the old team style: they aren’t talented, so they try to play it up as modern-day bullies.

From Vigneault through Tortorella and now Tocchet, the Flyers are being structured to be a physical checking team lacking the speed, passing, and shooting required to be a contender. They can force their way into the playoffs but will consistently be beat by teams that are simply faster and more talented.

The approach to every season is to be competitive to such a degree they will consistently miss out on high-end talent required to contend. They have maybe two players who could fit that description on the roster with another one coming up in the system. Champion teams wind up with an abundance of that talent. Briere’s cautioning patience while at the same time committing to the same approach that hindered Hextall. They’ve already made a few mistakes in developing talent and I feel like a misfire on Michkov or Zegras could set them back another 7-10 years–mostly because they have failed to adapt to the times.

Charlie usually straddles the fence as a journalist, however even he cannot justify the anemic slop that Tocchet is trotting out there offensively.

Great analysis of Tocchet’s offensive system, Charlie. The metrics show that his offenses kind of do rely on a high shooting percentage to succeed since the one and only time he had a very high shooting percentage his team was a top scoring offense. This is worrisome as you noted this cannot be relied upon. Also, if the team doesn’t have a high enough shooting percentage and they have a low volume of shots, they almost have no chance to score. I think he needs to emphasize getting more shots on goal while maintaining them as quality shots not just unscreened shots from distance. I would be in favor of any shots in tight. Waiting for the perfect shot is not an option in this offense. Neither is passing up on shots. On odd man rushes they should always shoot unless the pass is wide open. This guarantees a shot at least and it should be a quality shot at that.

Great article though, I really appreciated all of the data and your analysis of that data!

Just dropping a note to say this was a great article. The sort of thing you can’t get anywhere else and a great example of why I pay for Charlie’s writing.

Commenting a week late just to say more articles like this and less podcasts.