Despite the Flyers putting their cross-state arch rivals on the brink, sitting one game away from round two after a season that was almost a write-off, there is still one negative talking point that has gotten beaten to death for the past week or so. While the Flyers deserve plaudits for over-performing to a man in their round one series, it has cast a spotlight on some of their younger stars who haven’t been able to make an impact.
After Denver Barkey got off the snide in Game 4 with a tip-in goal late in the second period, it allowed the spotlight to turn squarely to Matvei Michkov.
After a sophomore slump in the regular season that came with some highly publicized conditioning concerns early on, Michkov has struggled to truly find a footing in his first playoff appearance. His play on puck in the offensive zone has seemed sluggish, he has taken some poor retaliation penalties, and the line consisting of Michkov, Noah Cates, and the aforementioned Barkey has only been able to muster 27.3% of the expected goal share while on the ice.
It’s become clear that, at a minimum, the pseudo-third line has been the Flyers worst throughout the series and needed to be shaken up. With Barkey scoring in Game 4, and generally looking more comfortable in the Flyers home games than he did on the road, there was very little justification for taking him out of the lineup. Cates meanwhile, is one of the NHL’s best defensive forwards and has looked confident playing in all three situations. That left Michkov as the one to draw the proverbial short straw, and Tocchet decided to swap him out for Alex Bump, in an attempt to scrounge up just a little more extra offense and create a more effective and cohesive line.
And that, justifiably, got both national media and the Flyers fanbase in a bit of a tizzy, especially following a game in which the Flyers seemed a step slower for the first time in the playoffs thus far. It all came to a head before game 5 in Pittsburgh, when Michkov got pulled from the lineup in favor of Alex Bump, who then proceeded to look like one of the Flyers’ best players in a narrow loss. While Bump had a great performance and made it hard to envision a world where he comes out for game 6, ultimately the removal of Michkov didn’t make all that much of a difference on the Flyers play.
Removing Michkov is more a credit to everyone else
When the play of Michkov is juxtaposed alongside the playoff coming out parties of players like Owen Tippett, Trevor Zegras, and Jamie Drysdale, as well as the meteoric rise of Porter Martone, it makes him look even worse than his play has warranted. The entirety of the roster, including veterans like Christian Dvorak, Rasmus Ristolainen, and Travis Sanheim, have played above their skis. Everyone seems to be moving in one direction under a Rick Tocchet gameplan that seems to maximize their talent, except for Michkov.
And from an X’s and O’s perspective, that isn’t necessarily surprising. Michkov isn’t someone who creates his offense off of the rush, and he’s never shown himself to be a tenacious forechecker or defensive stalwart. And despite the Flyers jumping out to a 3-0 lead in the series, Michkov never really found a place to make an impact.
Obviously part of this is his fault, but the style that maximizes the Flyers’ skillset as a team just doesn’t fit what Michkov is great at. A team like Carolina, who has a lot of inherent movement and can keep the puck in the opposing zone for minutes on end, would be more conducive to Michkov’s success. Conversely, it is obvious that the more defensive focused, quick strike offensive strategy that the Flyers have employed more suits the games of players like Tippett, Travis Konecny, and Tyson Foerster. And in a season that has become totally focused around maximizing the players on the roster and extending this ride for as long as possible, it makes as to why Tocchet would make the decision to play in a way that benefits the collective more than the individual.
There will be time in the future to tinker and figure out a way to best integrate Michkov into what the Flyers do well. There will also be ample time for Michkov to continue to improve his conditioning and two-way ability. But it’s crucial to remember that this was always going to be a process. From October, there were signs that Michkov may not be in the best place to massively improve in his second season, and it became clear as the season wore on that this was going to be a sophomore speed bump for the young Russian. That fact doesn’t change just because the team has over-achieved. While he was still able to reach both the 20-goal and 50-point marks, he’s been behind the 8 ball since day one, and those growing pains were only going to be exacerbated by the rigors of playoff hockey.
Instead of relitigating a Michkov situation with very few new developments, the focus should be on just how the rest of the roster, despite being filled with inexperienced playoff performers, has been able to galvanize themselves at the perfect time without any past experience. That is the actually surprising part, Michkov being scratched is simply a continuation of something that was already happening. He’ll get another chance this year, and has a long career ahead of him alongside a team that should only improve.
If the Flyers weren’t in the playoffs right now, and Michkov had ended his regular season with a stretch of 11 points in his last seven games, the discussion wouldn’t be happening at all. In a strange way, Michkov is almost a victim of his team’s success. It’s fair to point out the frailties of Michkov’s play, his pace, and his struggles at being an effective player when he doesn’t have as much time and space, but to make long-term projections based on what an upstart team needs in the moment doesn’t make sense.
