It is somewhat embarrassing to be this hung up about a player who was acquired as just a contract; a player to be on the roster or even a cap dump. Just an overall feeling of foolishness that we are still thinking about Sean Walker’s ability and role and what he was able to do for the Philadelphia Flyers in the first half of last season, but it was really something.
Maybe it was just him being able to be Drew Doughty’s understudy while in Los Angeles, but Walker truly elevated this entire team when he was on the ice last season. You don’t even need to think too hard about it — after he was sent to the Colorado Avalanche in a trade deadline move, the Flyers stunk so damn bad. Like, truly, truly terrible. A 6-10-3 record post-Walker is enough for us to just wonder what was so different. Maybe it was just bad luck — because after all they waved a playoff spot goodbye because of this stretch — or, like we’re thinking, it was the absence of what Walker brought that put them in this hole.
Is it really stupid and a little silly to be thinking about a player that has played for two different teams since being in Philadelphia? Yes. Is it weird to be really zeroing in on this while the Flyers are going through their own season? Well, it depends. It might be an old, exhausted topic at this point but this team just has not been able to replace what Walker did last season. And if the team truly wants to be respectfully competitive — that is debatable — then it’s even more of a glaring hole in this team.
While thinking about this little topic and desire for the Flyers to have just something else on the back end. And just trying to determine what is so different from when this team was a good and fun time, to what they are now (an offensive black hole that tries to block every single shot attempt), there was a quick “Sean Walker” search on Twitter. Trying to find some highlights that could easily tell the story of what this team is missing. And in the very first video that was clicked on, it proved it exactly.
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