The last time the Philadelphia Flyers made the playoffs, I was an 18-year-old high school senior who missed graduation because of COVID. Now I\u2019m 24 and finishing my master\u2019s degree \u2013 and I\u2019m sick and tired of watching the Flyers lose.<\/p>\n
I know there are probably many of you who are much older than I who have been waiting for a Stanley Cup to come down Broad Street for a lot longer than I have \u2013 and for that, I\u2019m sorry. It\u2019s frustrating watching your favorite hockey team struggle to be a contender, so that\u2019s why I\u2019m choosing to be delusional.<\/p>\n
I have been on the \u201ctank for a better draft pick\u201d train for a while now, and to be honest, it\u2019s pretty exhausting. For six years now, the Flyers have been two to three years away from being two to three years away \u2013 everyone\u2019s favorite quote. At some point, they\u2019re going to have to turn the corner, right?<\/p>\n
The last two Flyers games \u2013 their 4-1 win over the Washington Capitals and their 3-2 shootout win over the Minnesota Wild \u2013 have made me realize that I miss when this team won games and was competitive. It\u2019s so refreshing to talk about positive storylines like Owen Tippett dominating the Capitals<\/a> or Emil Andrae impressing in his return to the lineup<\/a>.<\/p>\n Even on Twitter or X \u2013 whatever you want to call it \u2013 being able to talk about the incredible work that defenseman Jamie Drysdale has put in, or how Trevor Zegras is looking great at center.<\/p>\n There is so much negativity on social media \u2013 not just Flyers social media \u2013 but all social media, so it\u2019s refreshing to look at things through orange-tinted glasses every once in a while.<\/p>\n Why I\u2019m choosing to be delusional<\/p>\n There are plenty of reasons to be delusional about where the Flyers currently stand. For starters, they\u2019re only five points back of a Wild Card spot in the Eastern Conference, and only six points back of third in the Metropolitan \u2013 after having an abysmal January.\u00a0<\/p>\n Now obviously they\u2019ll need help if they\u2019re going to squeak in, as there are still two teams ahead of them pushing for that last Wild Card spot, but it\u2019s a lot more fun to play meaningful hockey in March and April than it is being out of the race.<\/p>\n Another reason to be delusional is that the Flyers have a really solid core.<\/p>\n Trevor Zegras is having an incredible year and is on pace to score a career high in points. Jamie Drysdale is establishing himself as an incredible top four defenseman \u2013 if not a first pair guy \u2013 and his defensive game has taken a complete turnaround since coming over from Anaheim.<\/p>\n The young guys on the team are establishing that they can play at this level. Forwards Denver Barkey and Alex Bump have looked like quality NHL players, and they are 20 and 22 years old, respectively. Even Ty Murchison, in his short NHL stint, looked like a solid defenseman who could fit on the third pair, in the future since his season ended early due to injury.<\/p>\n Owen Tippett is showing that he can be more consistent \u2013 even when he\u2019s not scoring goals \u2013 by playing more physically and using his body away from the puck.<\/p>\n Travis Konecny is looking like Travis Konecny \u2013 leading this Flyers team in points for the fifth season in a row, and Dan Vladar looks like a star.<\/p>\n And on top of all that, they\u2019re hoping to add a healthy Tyson Foerster, a highly skilled Porter Martone, and a Matvei Michkov who is in better shape and hungry to prove the doubters wrong.<\/p>\n Rooting for the team to make the playoffs just feels better. Stressing about whether or not the Flyers will pick 12th or 14th overall just isn\u2019t worth the time and energy \u2013 in my opinion. This draft doesn\u2019t seem particularly deep at center anyway, and the last thing the Flyers need is another winger, and there are plenty of defensemen available throughout the projected first round. So, the options are either reach for a center who might just top out as a third-liner, or root for the players who are already part of this core to learn how to become winners and still get a solid prospect wherever they pick.<\/p>\n And it\u2019s also okay to feel negatively as a fan \u2013 you\u2019re allowed to have those feelings. Trust me, I get it, there are plenty of things that frustrate me \u2013 from reaching on draft picks, to signing a head coach I\u2019m not a fan of \u2013 but I love the Philadelphia Flyers, and I can\u2019t sit back and root for them to lose anymore.<\/p>\n I have too much fun when they win to care about whether or not these wins might push them from picking 10th in the draft to 17th.<\/p>\n So screw it \u2013 I\u2019m choosing to embrace the delusion. Maybe the Flyers sneak into the playoffs. Maybe they don\u2019t. Maybe this entire blog ages horribly in two weeks. But at least I\u2019ll actually enjoy watching the games again instead of refreshing Tankathon like I\u2019m trying to buy tickets to a Creed concert. Hockey is supposed to be fun, and rooting for wins is a lot more fun than trying to figure out the Flyers\u2019 draft lottery odds.\u00a0<\/p>\n If you\u2019re with me, welcome aboard the delusion train! And if you\u2019re not, that\u2019s okay too! Either way. Let\u2019s go Flyers!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The last time the Philadelphia Flyers made the playoffs, I was an 18-year-old high school senior who missed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523062,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-523061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523062"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}