We can all say that this is a Philadelphia Flyers pressure-less season for only so long. Before the 2024-25 regular season truly began, the expectations were low — possible being for this team to just not be embarrassingly terrible. And now nine games into this fresh campaign, they have certainly reached that level.
All of the hopes that the young players could take a step forward in development and show that they deserve to be on this team for the long-term and receive commitment from the front office, has gone out the window. Tyson Foerster has already suffered a healthy scratch. Owen Tippett’s shooting percentage is in the toilet despite firing dozens of pucks towards every single netminder. Joel Farabee has had maybe two noticeable performances, while disappearing most of the time. And the one good and consistent young skater, Cam York, is on the shelf for at least two weeks with an upper-body injury. Things are not looking too good for this supposedly burgeoning young core of talent.
These were the guys that theoretically will still be Flyers when Matvei Michkov reaches the heights of stardom we are all dreaming about. But right now, they are not looking like the supporting cast that the Russian phenom will need.
And while it certainly is not on the shoulders of one player to bring this group of players back to life, Bobby Brink does have an opportunity to take some weight off of their shoulders.
After earning four points in the first four games of the season, followed by two point-less appearances, Brink was sent up to the press box for the second half of the back-to-back against the Capitals and has not been on the ice since. A gutsy win over the Wild and a breathless loss to the Canadiens later, and Brink is back on Tuesday night in Boston against the Bruins to the right of Scott Laughton and Farabee on the left on the Flyers’ third line.
It is not the best option in terms of bringing some juice back to a team that was bone dry for most of the game against Montreal, but Brink can do just enough to possibly make it all gel together. Something needed to change and considering this is a player that might be fighting for his career this year, the healthy scratches could have provided a wake-up call.
Because after all, Brink’s future is not set in stone. He is under contract for this year and next, but just last season, the 23-year-old needed a demotion down to the Phantoms to truly let him know how he was doing and he has already been the victim of consecutive healthy scratches — this coaching staff sees some flaws with his game and in terms of the depth chart, Brink still has a ways to climb.
It won’t happen in just one game, but Brink needs to show just something real solid to not let him just fade into the background as that classic archetype of a player that is too good for the AHL, but has the bad habits and not enough top-end skill to counteract those habits, to make it in the NHL. We can’t let Brink be Seth Griffith 2.0, to put it plainly.
And that journey begins in Boston, as a sort of resetting and hopefully he feels rejuvenated enough to bring the boom in a way that a small winger can.
