Time To Bury The Bullies? And How About Lecavalier?

1975 was a trying time for the world. The United States was still in the throes of the Watergate scandal. President Ford was stuck in the midst of a rise of inflation and bad economic times. Amity Island was besieged by a killer shark. Finally, the Philadelphia Flyers had gooned their way to a second straight Stanley Cup.

OK, that last one ignores the fact that the Flyers had three future hall of fame players, a bevy of highly talented supporting players and a coach that should join Bernie Parent, Bob Clarke, Bill Barber and GM Keith Allen in the hall of Fame. But the lasting identity of those teams wasn’t Parent’s stellar goaltending, or Clarke’s gritty determination and leadership, or even Reggie Leach’s cannon of a shot. It was the wild eyed enthusiasm in which that team went to war with the other NHL teams.

Dave “The Hammer” Schultz, Andre “Moose” Dupont, Don “Big Bird” Saleski, Bob “Hound” Kelly and lesser enforcers didn’t back down and intimidated teams around the NHL. But to say that that intimidation was why they won is ridiculous.

What isn’t ridiculous is to say that the organization hasn’t clung to that identity to a degree.

It’s time for the Flyers to pack up a spade, dig a hole and bury the Broad Street Bullies once and for all.

The latest episode is, of course, Dan Carcillo’s one punch KO of Washington’s Matt Bradley. Carcillo got a 4 game suspension from the NHL for that. The problem is, Carcillo shouldn’t have even been considering a fight at all. Bradley checked him, cleanly, he took offense and cross checked Bradley and got called for it, then made it worse by trying to draw Bradley into a fight. More undisciplined play in a season that saw one coach lose his job, in large part, because his team couldn’t maintain their composure.

This is hardly Carcillo’s first incident of not picking his spots well. In last year’s playoffs, he beat Pittsburgh’s Max Talbot to a pulp off a face off, with the Flyers holding a 3-0 lead. Within two minutes it was 3-2, and the Penguins had a ton of momentum. Blaming Carcillo alone for that would be inane, but there was no point in fighting Talbot at that point.

The latest incident should be the death knell to Carcillo’s Flyer career. It should also ring a clarion to the end of Riley Cote’s Flyers tenure, too. Cote doesn’t have Carcillo’s track record as a offender, but his primary purpose as a player is to take a beating. If left to his hockey skills, Cote would be an ECHL 4th liner. Cote is a great guy, does a ton of charity work, but he doesn’t belong in the NHL. He’s there for staged fights, when the opposing team dresses their cement head.

Moreso than the Broad Street Bully mentality, what has to die is the bad habit of accepting a player’s repeated dumb mistakes because of the potential payoff of goals or getting under the opposing team’s skin. It’s one thing to have a Scott Hartnell, who is capable of 30 goals. It’s another to have a Carcillo.

For the Flyers to succeed with their new head coach, they will have to be a great deal more disciplined. That means guys have to be held accountable. That means that Dan Carcillo needs to be shown the door.

Carcillo will gone for 4 games...should it be for good?

Lecavalier?
According to Hockeybuzz.com’s Jon Jordan, one place that disgruntled Lightning forward Vincent Lecavalier would agree to waive his NMC to go to would be Philadelphia. Jordan speculates that it would take a Jeff Carter/Braydon Coburn package. Unfortunately, the salaries on that don’t work out.

I’d be a little tentative on taking the length of Lecavalier’s deal, not to mention the cap hit, but in a non-cap world, getting a guy like Vinny for Carter and Coburn would be a great move. It would be interesting to see if there’s any fire to this smoke.