Tough to feel sorry for Philadelphia Flyers after they goon it up against Washington Capitals
It’s tough to feel sorry for the Philadelphia Flyers. After showing zero effort against the Washington Capitals and giving up seven consecutive goals, the boys in the home Orange sweaters finally decided to prove that they cared by initiating a line brawl with the Caps and sending Ray Emery out to beat on an unwilling combatant.
To call this display embarrassing, as Claude Giroux did, would be an understatement. The Flyers were trying to appear engaged in the laziest and most lackadaisical way possible. By throwing the gloves and trying to take care of business “the good ol’ fashioned way.”
The Capitals can probably live with that, since they just gave Philly a heavy beating where it matters most. That’s up on the score board. 7-0? Without Alex Ovechkin in the lineup? Talk about a real sucker punch.
Does anyone think that the Flyers are supercharged suddenly after their bullish antics last night? Does anyone suddenly think that they care enough to go out and actually try to play some hockey games now?
No. Not by a long shot. This was a beaten and battered dog lashing out the only way it knew how. Instead of working hard and trying to get Claude Giroux going or iron out some kinks in a game that was clearly over, the Flyers collectively acted and played like children.
The thing is, Philadlephia couldn’t even win the fights they started. Steve Downie was hospitalized with a concussion and Vincent Lecavalier left the game with facial injuries after losing a fight to the much smaller Steve Oleksy.
How embarrassing is that? You can’t beat a team on the ice, so you initiate a five-on-five WWE-esque king of the ring brawl and proceed to lose that as well.
You never want to see a player injured, but if the Flyers are without two of their top-six forwards for the foreseeable future, they’ll have no one to blame but themselves.
The wheels have fallen off in Philly. Move along people, there’s nothing left to see here but wounded pride and brazen players that don’t understand how to win hockey games. Or how to lose with honor.