Congratulations To The 2016-17 Philadelphia Flyers For Officially Being Eliminated From Playoff Contention
I mean, anytime you have the opportunity to become the first team in NHL history to miss the playoffs the same year as your team goes on a 10-game win streak, you just have to take it. And with last night’s loss to the Rangers, we can officially say RIP to the 2016-17 Philadelphia Flyers Mens Professional Ice Hockey Team. October 14, 2016 – April 2, 2017. There were plenty of ups and downs along the way but mostly downs the more you look back on it. I’ll have more later in the weeks about what the Flyers need to do moving forward but holy fuck am I just relieved this shit show is finally over with.
I don’t know if I’d be able to stomach seeing them back door their way into that last wild card spot only to get swept in the 1st round. This was actually a fairly merciful way for the season to come to an end. I’ve been saying this for a while but we’ve all been waiting for the final “S” in the D.E.N.N.I.S System here. The Flyers had been inspiring hope for the past week or so now and it appeared the “separate entirely” wasn’t going to come until the final day of the regular season to really rip everybody’s heart out. But to get eliminated a week earlier on a Sunday night? At least that gives us, the fans, some time to step away for a week to reset so we can watch some playoff hockey without having complete resentment toward the game.
Every single person within the Flyers organization deserves some of the blame for how hard this season fell off the tracks. It’s only year 3 of the Hextall era but he hasn’t put the right pieces in place to build this team for sustained success. Hakstol was a fucking mess all season long and mismanaged the hell out of this roster. Claude Giroux, our supposed savior, would go for extended periods of time where you couldn’t even tell if he was playing or not. Same with Voracek. The goalies are exactly who we thought the goalies were. About as inconsistent as the daily SEPTA schedule. Ghost didn’t just randomly get benched for multiple games earlier this season. He put himself in that position where he wasn’t playing well enough to justify keeping him in the lineup every night. The rest of the defense (aside from Provorov) was shit. That’s my expert analysis. There are very few people on this roster who I can say had very little to do with the downfall of the 2016-17 Philadelphia Flyers. Wayne Simmonds, Ivan Provorov, Jordan Weal and that’s pretty much it. Guys would go on hot streaks and then guys would go on cold streaks. Inconsistency was what murdered the Flyers and it was a gruesome massacre.
Anyways, I guess I’m just equal parts relieved and depressed right now. I mean yeah, it’s great that we don’t have to suffer through this season anymore. But seeing all the optimism in the sports world right now with baseball season starting up and other NHL teams clinching playoff berths, it just sucks a whole lot of wang. When I’m miserable due to sports, I need everybody to be miserable with me. Seeing all this happy-go-lucky shit about fans having “hope” makes me want to go on a rampage. If there’s anything that we can take away from this Flyers season, it’s that sports are bad and we are all so so very dumb for investing so much of our lives into them because they only let us down.