Peter Laviolette called his star player Claude Giroux “the best player in the world,” in a series where two players on the other side were widely believed as the best by far. Giroux posted six goals and eight assists for 14 points, including complete masterpieces in game two (six points) and game six (three points). Giroux’s explosive hit on Sidney Crosby and subsequent goal within 32 seconds of the game could be taken as the tone-setting events for game six, but those events also worked as a wonderful metaphor for a changing of the guard for hockey in Pennsylvania.

Under the Mike Richards-led Philadelphia Flyers, Crosby and Evgeni Malkin dominated the series both times they met. The Flyers were simply unable to shut them down. Both times the Flyers fell in defeat to the Pittsburgh Penguins in the playoffs since the lockout, they chugged along to the Stanley Cup Final, including a victory in 2009. Since then, though, the Penguins have only won one playoff series, and the Flyers have simply been better. Read more

The Philadelphia Flyers have been playing tremendously well down the stretch, and they have done it without the services of key contributors like Chris Pronger. For the last little stretch though, we seem to have forgotten about a certain forward on this team—one James van Riemsdyk.

Oh, van Riemsdyk, the heralded second overall pick of the 2007 draft. The man taken after Patrick Kane. The guy who had a coming out party in the 2011 playoffs. Perhaps the most criticized Flyer next to defenseman Matt Carle. JVR always had a unique skillset that included a tall, lanky exterior with a blistering wrist shot and a power forward type mold to fulfill. Too bad he continued to play soft, and his development has been progressing like molasses coming out of a jar.

That development speed has turned into an important decision for the Flyers to make regarding his future in Philly.

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When the Philadelphia Flyers acquired Pavel Kubina and Nicklas Grossmann, it was to address a need. No goaltender was playing well, and the Flyers could not defend. A few weeks later, Kubina, Meszaros and Timonen all fell to injury at about the same time. Too bad the first star of the week in the NHL, Ilya Bryzgalov, decided to post a team record four shutouts in his last five games, including another record three in a row. Granted, Timonen returned to the lineup last night, but still…wow.

The Flyers held the New Jersey Devils to three shots in the final period with some of the finest defense a hockey team could ever hope to put on the ice. Everyone played well. The defense continues to block shots, even with the big guys out of the lineup. The secondary scorers continue to score. Everything is going well for the orange and black right now.

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The Philadelphia Flyers have not won consecutive games since mid-January. You can see why worry continues to be the name of the game with the legion of fans expressing their displeasure on so many different players. Paul Holmgren made some moves to help them win more games, but all it has resulted in is more losses than wins.

It’s a small sample size to draw conclusions right now, but since the Grossman acquisition, the Flyers are 1-2-0 in those three games.

Inconsistency is a tough thing to fix. Players will always tell you that there is no possible way to wake up for every single game and give the same effort. Some games get mixed into the schedule, and other ones, you get beat. Some, you get the upper hand even though you don’t deserve it. The Flyers seem to be stuck in a rut of constantly changing efforts.

One game, they can look brilliant (Winnipeg), playing hard, forechecking hard, getting scoring opportunities and finding a way to win the game. Other games, they take a period (or periods) off (Edmonton), they don’t crash the net, and their scoring chances come up short, so the goalie looks unstoppable. Again, this happens, but for an elite team like the Flyers, it’s pretty unacceptable to be wavering between two moods.

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I was listening to the midday show on Sportsradio WIP yesterday afternoon. Anthony Gargano was out for the day, so it was Glen Macnow and Rob Ellis on the mic. Their first order of business was to torch the Flyers on their weekend of failure. Of that, the Flyers were well deserving of that disdain. Once they got to the subject of trades and other problems though, that’s where things started to go downhill.

Earlier that day, and throughout, Ilya Bryzgalov was the scapegoat on the air. Even though he hadn’t played in over a week due to his bout with the flu, it was his fault the team is where it is now. Bryzgalov had nothing to do with the Flyers’ latest slide. Not only should the Flyers be worried, but apparently according to these experts, he should be dealt, too. They did make one good point—he is untradeable, but isn’t that the point of his contract?

Something’s wrong with this picture…

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