Is Fletcher any good?

MacDonald4MVP

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Hi folks. With all the signs pointing towards flyers horong him as new gm what are his perceived strengths, weaknesses or major coups and blunders from his time in Minnesota?
 

Bazeek

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Hi folks. With all the signs pointing towards flyers horong him as new gm what are his perceived strengths, weaknesses or major coups or blunders in your opinion?
I've mentioned it on the Flyers forum, but I think he'd be a good hire. His biggest struggle in Minnesota was to acquire high-end talent without ever drafting in the top-5, and Philadelphia already has guys like Giroux, Couturier, Provorov, etc. It seems like a lot of the pieces that have been missing with the Wild are already in place with the Flyers.

If they just need someone to address the holes further down in the roster without selling off the future, Fletcher would be a solid choice. He's not afraid to pursue and make moves when there are obvious needs. He had a habit of spending 2nds a little too liberally, but would generally hang onto 1sts and prospects that were on their way to developing into NHL players. For all the yelling about him spending 1sts willy-nilly at the deadline the only time he traded one for a rental was the Hanzal trade. It turned out badly, but it made sense to me at the time: it looked like the best team we'd had in years and that draft didn't look all that amazing. I don't think there'd be nearly as much angst about it if Allen hadn't been ridiculous in the 1st round.

Anyway, he's a good GM and I think it's telling that Fenton hasn't exactly jumped in and started dismantling the team he inherited. Whether or not he can build a Cup-contender remains to be seen, but he'd have a few advantages in Philly that he never had in Minnesota.
 

TaLoN

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Fletcher made his biggest blunders when he was first learning the job. He got better as time went on, but we just couldn't find that tip end talent, but that's not completely his fault.

He took a terrible team with absolutely nothing in terms of prospects and turned them into a perennial playoff team, just not good enough for the cup.

I think he will make an excellent GM again as he was already above avg here.
 

nickschultzfan

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Fletcher is good if he stays within himself as a GM. He has a plan and is creative about accomplishing it. He's not afraid to take risks. He is pretty good about re-signing players to reasonable contracts (except when they get into their mid-30s).

I think he has got into trouble when he was pressured by our owner or wanted to impress our owner. That's when he did stupid things like trade young players/picks away at the trade deadline or completely overthought the expansion draft.
 

Goose312

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He's an alright GM. Part of his blunders were due to inexperience, another part due to ownership wanting a competitive team that wasn't ready to be competitive yet. You would probably be getting him at a good time where he has learned some costly lessons at another franchise's expense. The only knock I really have against specifically him is the people he hired to run the draft were often too conservative, focusing on closer to ready NHL prospects instead of game breakers that needed development of the rest of their game. His ability, patience or even desire to let players develop in the AHL seemed to not really exist while with the Wild.
 

Bazeek

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He's an alright GM. Part of his blunders were due to inexperience, another part due to ownership wanting a competitive team that wasn't ready to be competitive yet. You would probably be getting him at a good time where he has learned some costly lessons at another franchise's expense. The only knock I really have against specifically him is the people he hired to run the draft were often too conservative, focusing on closer to ready NHL prospects instead of game breakers that needed development of the rest of their game. His ability, patience or even desire to let players develop in the AHL seemed to not really exist while with the Wild.
I might have this wrong, but wasn't part of the problem that he basically kept Risebrough's scouting staff intact for years? Once Flahr was given more control of the drafts we saw less of the Bussieres/Gabriel type picks and more guys like Shaw and Lodnia.

Either way, the Flyers seem to be in a better place with amateur scouting than we have been.
 

57special

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The main thing about Fletcher is that he is a pro. Doesn't make an ass of himself, is smooth with the press, has a knack of getting players to sign at a reasonable rate. Also is pretty good at getting big FA signings(i.e. Parise/Suter and Boudreau). For every bad trade and move, he made a couple of good ones.
 
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Saga of the Elk

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Fletcher started here in 2009, best prospects were Scandella and Cuma? Best youngish guys were Burns, Pouliot, Gillies?

He added Haula, Kuemper, Granlund, Zucker, Nino, Coyle, Brodin, Dumba, Spurgeon, Parise and Suter by the end of 2012.

He did things that were pretty dumb in retrospect (Lucia, Phillips, the timing of Pominville, Heatley, Havlat, Setoguchi, Moulson, Stewart, Hanzal) but I think he has an idea of how to build a competitive team.

In Philly he gets Provorov, Hart, Sanheim, Konecny, Patrick, Frost, Rubtsov, Myers, et al. He has Voracek, Simmonds, Giroux, JVR.

It's a great situation for him, and I wish him well.
 

State of Hockey

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I might have this wrong, but wasn't part of the problem that he basically kept Risebrough's scouting staff intact for years? Once Flahr was given more control of the drafts we saw less of the Bussieres/Gabriel type picks and more guys like Shaw and Lodnia.

Either way, the Flyers seem to be in a better place with amateur scouting than we have been.

Risebrough's crew ran the 2009 draft. Turned out to be a very good one (for a change) that Fletcher later squandered. Flahr and company started in 2010. Good first year, but then it went downhill. So in other words, no, Risebrough's scouting staff was gone as quickly as possible.

If you don't count the top-10 picks, what the Wild have left for all of Fletcher's drafts is horrific.
 

Bazeek

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Risebrough's crew ran the 2009 draft. Turned out to be a very good one (for a change) that Fletcher later squandered. Flahr and company started in 2010. Good first year, but then it went downhill. So in other words, no, Risebrough's scouting staff was gone as quickly as possible.

If you don't count the top-10 picks, what the Wild have left for all of Fletcher's drafts is horrific.
I might be conflating two different questions then. The first is who ran the drafts, and that may have always been Flahr from 2010 on. I was thinking he took over more control of the whole process around 2014 or so, but I might be imagining that. I can't find any citations to back it up, anyway.

The second question is who's been doing the scouting, and as far as I know the entire department under Lapointe was kept pretty much intact from Risebrough to Fletcher and through to today. I'm sure there's been turnover in the 9 years since, but it seems like it's been pretty minimal. And for the Flyers it might be a plus if he does the same in Philadelphia, because their scouts seem to have done pretty well in recent years.

As for how the mix of Fletcher/Flahr and the Flyers scouts will work, we'll have to wait and see.
 
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SupremeNachos

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Risebrough's crew ran the 2009 draft. Turned out to be a very good one (for a change) that Fletcher later squandered. Flahr and company started in 2010. Good first year, but then it went downhill. So in other words, no, Risebrough's scouting staff was gone as quickly as possible.

If you don't count the top-10 picks, what the Wild have left for all of Fletcher's drafts is horrific.
How do you kill that which has no life? This dude has survived running in traffic 2 times now guys!
 

State of Hockey

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I might be conflating two different questions then. The first is who ran the drafts, and that may have always been Flahr from 2010 on. I was thinking he took over more control of the whole process around 2014 or so, but I might be imagining that. I can't find any citations to back it up, anyway.

The second question is who's been doing the scouting, and as far as I know the entire department under Lapointe was kept pretty much intact from Risebrough to Fletcher and through to today. I'm sure there's been turnover in the 9 years since, but it seems like it's been pretty minimal. And for the Flyers it might be a plus if he does the same in Philadelphia, because their scouts seem to have done pretty well in recent years.

As for how the mix of Fletcher/Flahr and the Flyers scouts will work, we'll have to wait and see.

Yeah I think it's two. I see what you're saying. I don't remember if there was a change in 2014. I do remember Flahr running drafts from 2010.

There were some scouting changes under Lapointe in 2009. Here's one article about four scouts: Wild adds four to scouting staff If you compare that list to the current list, most scouts are gone. A few remain. Scouts aren't tied to regimes as much. I wouldn't expect big changes to the Flyers staff, at least not right away.
 

nickschultzfan

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I’ll forever remember Nick Leddy for Cam Barker.
I'll remember it because I was living in Chicago at the time, and my secretary, who was a Blackhawks season ticket holder and die-hard hockey fan, started laughing maniacally when she saw the news. I asked her what happened, and she just told me the deal, and I went into denial, thinking that couldn't be the whole deal and there had to be a 1st round pick involved. She then started to feel bad and said "well, maybe Minnesota can teach Barker to skate and play defense. He was a high draft pick."

However, looking back, there were worse things. Leddy really has never been more than an offensive #4 LHD. And he's not better than Suter, Brodin, or Scandella.
 

Olcoach

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It's a much more complex answer than that.
Not really, it's a binary question. Managing draft capitol, expansion mis-management, trade history? Other than Stahl dropping into his lap please name one thing he accomplished that made us say Wow over WTF.
 

Bazeek

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Not really, it's a binary question. Managing draft capitol, expansion mis-management, trade history? Other than Stahl dropping into his lap please name one thing he accomplished that made us say Wow over WTF.
Signing Parise and Suter certainly had me saying "Wow." Landing Boudreau was less dramatic, but still kind of a surprise. The Burns trade was exciting when it happened; I still remember cheers from the draft floor. Ditto for the Pominville trade. The Nino trade was half "Wow, Fletcher" and half "WTF, Snow?!" The Dubnyk trade and Spurgeon signing weren't immediate "Wow"s, but they developed into that over weeks/months. The Brodziak trade was more of a "Nice" than a "Wow." Thinking back, the Havlat signing was shocking at the time. Flipping him for Heatley was, too...

The more I think about this the more I think there weren't more than 6 months that went by under Fletcher where he did something that injected a little optimism into the fanbase. It didn't add up to a Cup, but there were more hits than misses overall.
 
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Victorious Secret

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Getting a 2nd for a cooked Setoguchi was the biggest Wow for me. His record in non-Wow trades is actually pretty good. But, Pominvillex2, Hanzal, Burns, turns his Wow-acquisitions record negative.
 

Olcoach

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Signing Parise and Suter certainly had me saying "Wow." Landing Boudreau was less dramatic, but still kind of a surprise. The Burns trade was exciting when it happened; I still remember cheers from the draft floor. Ditto for the Pominville trade. The Nino trade was half "Wow, Fletcher" and half "WTF, Snow?!" The Dubnyk trade and Spurgeon signing weren't immediate "Wow"s, but they developed into that over weeks/months. The Brodziak trade was more of a "Nice" than a "Wow." Thinking back, the Havlat signing was shocking at the time. Flipping him for Heatley was, too...

The more I think about this the more I think there weren't more than 6 months that went by under Fletcher where he did something that injected a little optimism into the fanbase. It didn't add up to a Cup, but there were more hits than misses overall.
Ok, you win by naming one WOW. Signing BB was it for me. The rest, meh. I'm afraid I won't live out the Parise/Sutter contracts. You mentioned the Pominville trade, was that coming or going? Lol.
 

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