Wednesday Morning Fly By: Winter Classic Post-Mortem

Today's open discussion thread, complete with your daily dose of Philadelphia Flyers-related news and notes...

• The Winter Classic was the lowest-rated game in the event's history: [Frequent Flyers] [Puck Daddy] [delcotimes.com]
• Five reasons the game will bounce back next year: [Puck The Media]
• It's pretty much a done deal that Detroit gets the next Winter Classic. What happens after that? [Puck Daddy]
• Looking ahead to tomorrow's game against Chicago: [CSNPhilly]
• Allentown has begun demolishing buildings for the Phantoms new arena: [mcall.com]
• Michael Leighton will start the AHL Classic, and injury updates on Tom Sestito and Erik Gustafsson: [Phantoms Forum]
• More Phoenix to Seattle talk: [Puck Daddy]
• NHL Power Rankings for this week shows L.A. make a move: [SB Nation Philly]
• Tragic news out of Minnesota as a high school hockey player has a severed spinal cord after being hit twice along the boards: [MyFoxTwinCities]
• Rene Bourque with a blatant elbow to the face of Nicklas Backstrom, similar to Ville Leino on Matt Read: [Puck Daddy]
• Looking at 40+ year old goalies and Dwayne Roloson: [Brodeur is a Fraud]
• A graphical (did I use it right this time?) look at PDO streaks and how shooting/save percentages converge toward the mean: [Arctic Ice Hockey]
• Inside Gary Bettman's New Year's Eve party: [Down Goes Brown]
• Lastly, a fantastic article on Gary Bettman, the Winter Classic, and NBC. Absolutely worth your time: [Deadspin]