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| Courtesy of Crossing Broad |
by Bob Herpen
Phanatic Hockey Editor
The second of two parts examining the troubles, issues and unavoidable nonsense surrounding the state of the Flyers' captaincy, now focusing on the 21st Century.
We left off with the untimely ascension of Eric Desjardins to the Flyers’ captaincy in the wake of the Eric Lindros situation and the former's willingness to give it up all too easily. “Rico” loved being captain so much due to the added pressure, he up and quit, in October, 2001. As many veteran beats would quote the 1993 Cup winner both on and off the record, “aye yi yi.”
No less a respectable rag such as the New York Post reported at the time there were rumblings of disenchantment with then head coach Bill Barber – who himself endured an Icarean fall from Jack Adams Award winner the previous spring to being booted off the bench less than a year later.
The grim reaper not named Stu Grimson came next for Keith Primeau, for whom it took a long time to receive the good graces of the fanbase after being acquired from Carolina in January 2000 for the beloved Rod Brind’Amour. A veteran centerpiece by his fifth year here, Primeau looked to turn a scalding-hot 2004 playoff run into longer-term success with the Flyers. Alex Perezhogin – the only way fans would ever recall his name – permanently put an end to those dreams with one ill-timed elbow in October 2005 at Montreal.
That set the stage for Derian Hatcher. Hatcher was the first American-born captain to win a Stanley Cup (with Dallas in 1999) and became the first U.S.-born skater to take the role in Philadelphia, albeit on an interim basis initially since it was unknown if Primeau’s concussion was serious enough to end his career.
Once Primeau was officially cooked, the mantle passed to Peter Forsberg in September 2006. A first-round draft pick in 1991 who went onto fame and fortune in Quebec and Denver, Foppa came back to adoring crowds the year before and established himself as a dominant center – when he was healthy. Forsberg played exactly 100 regular-season games as a Flyer, missing 38 others until being dealt to Nashville on Feb. 15, 2007 in a transaction whose trade tree yielded four players and neatly set up the post-Forsberg era.
The stain on his tenure was also not his fault. Five days after an embarrassing 9-1 loss at Buffalo dropped the team’s record to 1-4-1, the club’s hockey ops structure fell victim to “Black Sunday.” That morning, Oct. 22, 2006, Bob Clarke was allowed to step down as GM, Paul Holmgren was appointed successor, with head coach Ken Hitchcock being fired and replaced with the player-friendly 2005 Calder Cup champion coach John Stevens.
That led to Jason Smith. By then skating the 15th of his 16-year-NHL career, Smitty seemed to be the anchor a young roster needed. Until his agent let it slip in the spring of 2008 that his client wanted to test free agency, which signalled the end of his one-year run once the Orange and Black were eliminated by the rival Penguins in the Eastern finals.
So now we get to Mike Richards. One of the two Golden Children who rode that ‘05 AHL title into spots on the NHL roster, along with Jeff Carter. Given the “C” after serving notice during the club’s surprise ‘08 run, he became the face of the franchise heading into just his fourth NHL campaign.
Richie was initially as tenacious in seeking the puck on the ice as he was seeking companionship off the ice. We were all witness to The Shift.
But then we also were hostage to Dry Island. And those times on camera where he held a Thousand Yard Stare that rivaled those of World War I and Vietnam veterans. The burden, it seemed, was placed on his shoulders too early and seemed too great to bear for the kid from Kenora, Ontario.
And then, just once, on June 23, 2011, we saw Holmgren’s Viking veneer drop when a media member asked if they really could have kept Richards instead of unloading his contract to the Kings to eventually acquire goaltender and amateur cosmonaut Ilya (Humangous Beeg) Bryzgalov.
“It’s disappointing to be traded from a place like Philadelphia where hockey is so big,” Richards said in a piece published the next day authored the LA Times’ beat Helene Elliott. “Decisions have to be made … I think it was more of a business decision than a personal one. Which doesn’t make it easier but at the same time allows you to sleep a little better at night.”
Of note during this era, multiple reports (now hiding behind a paywall) stating both center Danny Briere and franchise cornerstone Simon Gagne turned down the captaincy. Somehow, their reputations remained intact even among the older, more blue-collar-leaning fans who still hold Clarke as the alpha and omega.
Enter the mainstream media’s best friend, Chris Pronger. Prongs brought veteran savvy and a way of
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| From CSN Philly |
First sidelined by a scary incident with his eye in late October, 2011, Pronger somehow returned to action after missing only 6 games, only to be permanently felled by post-concussion effects following a loss in Winnipeg in mid November.
We all remember Sam Carchidi’s infamously bold prediction that Claude Giroux had officially announced his presence as team leader after opening Game 6 in 2012 with a thunderous check on the eclipsed Sidney Crosby immediately followed by the game’s opening score? It apparently led to the longest single captaincy tenure in franchise history, one that didn't even officially start until late January due to a lockout.
Did Giroux do anything else that would have justified his remaining team captain for almost 10 full seasons? The man is hockey’s version of the Teflon Don. Nothing sticks.
The punters will die on the hill that the organ-eye-zation (three GMs worth) repeatedly failed to acquire the proper talent. You *can* make an argument that nobody else fit the bill. That’s actually a solid indictment of the churning brain trust who were allergic to getting this right.
Meanwhile, Crosby helped the likes of Jake Guentzel, Patric Hornqvist, Bryan Rust, Carl Hagelin and Chris Kunitz become Stanley Cup champions.
Looking at the long-term damage the Pronger situation wreaked on the leadership matrix, who could have been a credible long-term stop gap?
Jaromir Jagr? Well, he followed the money. Briere was at the end of his career content as an alternate. I don’t even want to get into discussing Wayne Simmonds as a taboo breaker. Hartnell Down? Bruh. Kimmo Timonen? His unimpeachable professionalism netted him the captaincy for a young Nashville franchise but his personality was in reality way too taciturn to be a motivator for a legacy franchise loaded with expectation.
It isn’t a ringing endorsement but Giroux was really the choice by de-fault. And if you’re familiar with Homer Simpson, those are the two greatest words in the English language.
Laude spent exactly 1,000 games with the Flyers and exactly 715 of those with the “C.” How much of a legacy can really exist when exactly four playoff appearances yielded exactly one playoff series win, albeit during the COVID-shortened season? Again, can’t wait to hear from the G-Stans.
Sean Couturier currently holds the job, only having been officially designated on Valentine's Day 2024. But with Rick Tocchet now in charge and the sands in Coots’ hourglass already falling, let’s quote Ecclesiastes. There is nothing new under the sun. The decision for the captaincy hinges on a coach’s ability to tread the line between maintaining old relationships and fostering new ones.
“Had a few conversations with him over the summer,” the cagey Couturier told Jackie Spiegel in an Inquirer piece from Sept. 3. “Met him at the end of last year in person for the first time. Really looking forward to getting going and trying to build a winning team here, get back into the playoffs, and be Stanley Cup contenders.”
Couturier’s usefulness as an NHL-caliber player is bound to expire before the rebuild’s success and definitely before his contract, which is up in 2030. Yet, with his eventual retirement on the horizon and the fact that no head coach since Mike Keenan has lasted four full seasons, here’s yet another impossible leadership crossroads.
History tells us Tocchet’s next “C” change will be one based on necessity and likely won’t be a lasting one.
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