Snider wants a goalie, too; Pronger surgery set
The Philadelphia Inquirer Blog - Flyers Report: Broad Street Bull
Snider wants a goalie, too; Pronger surgery set
Sam Carchidi, Inquirer Staff Writer
Ed Snider made it perfectly clear: The Flyers’ goalie carousel will stop. Now.
In an exclusive interview with The Inquirer on Wednesday, Snider, chairman of the Flyers’ parent company, Comcast-Spectacor, called the team’s recently completed season a “major disappointment” and strongly implied that adding a goalie was atop his priority list
After finishing second in the Eastern Conference and outlasting Buffalo in the opening round of the playoffs, the Flyers were swept by the Boston in the conference semifinals.
During the playoffs, the Flyers equaled a dubious NHL record by making seven in-game goalie switches.
“It was strange, and something I never want to see again,” said Snider, adding he had a "productive" meeting Wednesday with general manager Paul Holmgren and Peter Luukko, the Comcast-Spectacor president.
The Flyers had a 3.46 playoff goals-against average, placing them 14th out of 16 teams.
Told that the fan base was lamenting about needing a true No. 1 goalie for a few decades, Snider fired back: “I want one, too.”
He paused.
“So either one of the goalies we have has to step up in training camp, or we have to make improvements to make sure it happens. But we are NEVER going to go through the goalie issues we’ve gone through in the last couple of years again.”
That sounds like Snider in the early 1970s, when he vowed to never be pushed around again by the St. Louis Blues or other teams _ and added big, tough players. The Broad Street Bullies were born.
Snider’s tone suggested the Flyers are prepared to either deal for a goalie (Los Angeles’ Jonathan Bernier? The Islanders’ Evgeni Nabokov?), or sign a free-agent, such as Ilya Bryzgalov of Phoenix.
Signing a marquee free-agent goalie will be difficult because the Flyers have little cap space.
Snider didn’t see that as a problem.
“If we trade or go for a goalie (through free-agency), we’ll make it work,” he said. “We can make anything work, even with the cap.”
Snider made it a point to say that rookie Sergei Bobrovsky was viewed as the Fyers' "goalie of the future."
In the series against Boston, the Flyers were outscored, 20-7. Snider acknowledged that losing Chris Pronger (back injury) for the last three games played a major role.
"We were beaten by a totally better team," he said. "The extremes in the goaltending, from their goalie (Tim Thomas) to ours, had an effect on our team. I don't look at it as why this guy only had one goal or this guy played that way. The bottom line is, when you have a goalie playing out of his mind (like Thomas), that confidence spreads to the whole team; the whole team becomes confident. And when your goalie is not playing well...."
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The Flyers announced that Chris Pronger will undergo surgery Thursday in New York. It will be his fourth surgery in less than 10 months.
The club also said Mike Richards (left wrist), Blair Betts (left pinky), Andrej Meszaros (right wrist) and Michael Leighton (torn hip labrum) underwent surgery on Wednesday.
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On Thursday, Snider will tour the Laura Sims Skatehouse to monitor progress on one of three city-owned rinks that his foundation is helping to renovate.
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Follow Sam Carchidi on Twitter at www.twitter.com/BroadStBull.
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Snider once said in the early years that we'd never be intimidated again and the Bullies were born. Hopefully we get that stud goalie we've been needing and still keep some depth on offense and defense.— burholme- The solution is really simply. Forget about all of this nonsense about trading Carter or Richards, which make no mistake is complete nonsense. Those guys have too many years and too much money for anyone to agree to trade for them. Neither will be traded. Nor should they be traded. The solution is to sign a goalie within our cap limits of 1.5-3.0 million depending on the Leino deal. The goalie should be a veteran goalie, with a solid history, who can mentor Bob into being the goalie of the future. That solution... wait for this brilliant idea ..... is Evgeni Nabakov. A fellow Russian, who can not only help Bob in goal, he can help him with his english. Sign Nabokov to AT MOST a two year deal for 2 million a season, and you have a reasonably priced, once top of the line goalie, in your net. Go get him, even if the Islanders try to keep him around, give them Matt Walker or somebody for him.— lawsuit time
- Was thinking the same thing burholme. Its fine to lose depth - I am not even sure that we had that much on offense anyway. People keep pointing to the fact that we had 8 20+ scorers, but where were they on the PP? It was just a cliche that everyone kept saying until they believed it.— gob1234
- Why is it that Bernier keeps coming up? LA isn't going to trade him, as their GM has said repeatedly, and even if they did, it would require a package involving JVR and/or Giroux. It's just not going to happen.— Mike P
- there are very few teams who would turn down a pair of top six forwards for their current starting goaltenders much less a prospect who has yet to win the starting job. it seems as if many of the opinions expressed here are taken from a fantasy league and not from an actual results based viewpoint. — yantastic
- Why is it that Bernier keeps coming up? LA isn't going to trade him, as their GM has said repeatedly, and even if they did, it would require a package involving JVR and/or Giroux. It's just not going to happen.— Mike P
- Nice to see Carchidi arriving late to the Bernier party. I have only been suggesting that option since LAST summer. I remember that other nitwit Panaccio shooting it down last year too. Looks like everyone is on board now! Just deal them Carter and Versteeg and get your goalie and a solid winger (either Dustin Brown or Wayne Simmonds) to augment Richards. There are too many synergies between the LA Kings and Flyers for this kind of deal not to occur.— UncleEddie
- Nabokov is not an improvement. Bryzgalov is probably our best bet.— Tartan69
- yeah, and how are we going to pay Bryzgalov 5 million a year for 3 years and not go over the cap? Oh wait, right... we'll trade Carter's 12 year contract to the Islanders for Grabner. HA! Yeah, and they may throw Tavares into the deal too. You people either don't know anything about hockey, or failed 2nd grade mathematics.. or both.— lawsuit time
- What saddens me more than the Flyers early exit is the absolute lack of hockey knowledge from my peers and so-called "fans"...THE FLYERS HAD NABOKOV'S RIGHTS THIS SUMMER. HE CHOOSE RUSSIA OVER THIS TEAM. THEY LOW BALLED HIM. Get it? The Flyers tried to nab him for a 7th round pick, news reports as follows:"Of course, things didn't come together between Nabokov and the Flyers. The Nabokov camp wanted too much money, as the Flyers offer was reportedly at $2 million for one season -- a more-than 50 percent paycut for Nabokov. Call it pride, call it ego, or simply call it a grand misjudgment of the goalie market. Whatever the case, Nabokov felt he was worth more than that. Unfortunately, no one else did, and Nabokov went to Russia."
— MichaelZoe - I enjoyed my second grade math so much I took it twice.
I don't know how Holmgren can pull it off financially but when the chairman says get a number one goalie, he gets a number one goalie. Holmgren can do the math or hit the bricks.— schultz8 - The team can probably sign Bryzgalov for less than $5 million per. He's a FA and may have to settle for less money in this NHL, capped. We'll be without Zherdev and others to free up some money anyway, so it can work mathematically. No one is going to really touch Carter with his lengthy contract anyway. Richards can play, when he's not hurt.— NYluvsPhylers
- And while we're at it, I bet teams like Vancouver with all of their injury issues would love a Mike Richards or Jeff Carter. They can dump some salaries. Or other teams with strong leadership like the Preds who have cap space might be in the market for a Richards or Carter. To think that we're simply going to spend our way out of this is the insanity. To think the next Khabibulin is going to be healthy, ready, available, and work is a worthwhile gamble. But the TRUE way to stop this going forward is to get back your #1 draft picks for Richards, Carter (or others), package them and trade up as high as possible to snag the TOP goalie per draft for the next 1-3 years. In the mean time, a big name guy like Khabibulin with a Cup ring is a great answer, but you need a pipeline of competition of GREAT goalies in the farm system, not late 3-8th round picks or project player. Please, please, please, Mr Snider, seek out Scotty Bowman before he is too old as a special advisor on this one. He helped his son turn around the Blackhawks FAST. I'll take ONE CUP and start there.— MichaelZoe
- MichaelZoe, Nabakov loved playing in Russia so much that he tried to come back to the NHL halfway through the season. The only reason he's not playing for Detroit right now is because the Islanders smartly grabbed him to try and pry a draft pick from the wings. Based on the goalie market last year and the free agents available, he may be more accepting of a 2 million per year deal. Not saying that's the way they should go, but I wouldn't rule it out because of what happened last summer.— Mkdazmedia
- Nabokov chose the money over all teams in the NHL last season. He mistakenly thought he would command a $5 million salary still, he didn't get it, and he went to rot in the KHL with the likes of Yashin and Afinogenov. He must not have liked it too much, since he's apparently back despite still being under contract in the KHL. Perhaps the extra money isn't worth playing in there and living in Russia. Or maybe he'll go back to the KHL again. Who knows.... maybe he'll be willing to accept a smaller deal to be in the NHL and we can sign him in the 1.5-3 million range depending on the number of years (since he's 35 or something). We can't afford Bryzgalov, and even if we could, I wouldn't pay him anything near 5 million because he really not that great. He's not Miller, or Thomas, or Brodeur, or Luongo, or Fleury. He puts up above average numbers. He basically Kari Lehtonen.— lawsuit time
