When John Tortorella was hired as the 23rd head coach in Philadelphia Flyers history, it was never about the present. While then-general manager Chuck Fletcher wasn’t ready to begin a rebuild, one that fully started once he was fired toward the end of Tortorella’s first season, Tortorella’s bluntness never failed to acknowledge the team’s shortcomings, for better or for worse.
Fast-forward 33 months, and the future is now the present. At least kind of. Tortorella’s dismissal last week was surprising, but only because of how staunchly the Flyers had defended him at every turn before then. His views on Kevin Hayes, Ivan Provorov, and Tony DeAngelo were turned into action by Fletcher’s successor Daniel Briere; the first two players were moved out in his first two trades, and the third was bought out after just one season in Philadelphia. The hard-nosed play style that he encouraged and cemented in players with his infamous training camp bag skate. The healthy scratchings and benchings that came for everyone from Sean Couturier to Matvei Michkov to Cam York were never publicly chastised by management. However, Tortorella’s dismissal after an interaction after York was benched last Sunday shows their true feelings.
Of course, most franchises aren’t going to lambast the person they’ve freely chosen to lead their roster. But most don’t have their coach pen letters to the fans or make hype videos for their signature systems, either. Tortorella was supposed to be something more than a coach to the Flyers. A culture bearer, a tone-setter, a barometer who could measure how close the Flyers were to returning to being the Flyers, not the mess wearing Orange and Black that finished with the franchise’s second-worst points percentage (.372) the season before he arrived.
Tortorella was never going to be the Flyers’ coach forever. He turned 64 a week after getting the job back in 2022. But when he was let go last week, without much public build-up, it felt like Tortorella had become just another coach, at least retroactively.
The Strides That Were Made
For someone viewed as the opposite of a new school coach, it’s ironic that some of Tortorella’s shining advances come from advanced statistics. After ranking 23rd in 5-on-5 expected goals share during his inaugural season, the Flyers jumped to seventh last season, the highest mark of any non-playoff team. They sustained that success this season, sitting in eighth place with a 52.11% mark (only 0.38% lower than 2023-24), with every team above them poised to make the playoffs except for the Utah Hockey Club, which is still in the hunt (according to Natural Stat Trick).
For all of his concerns regarding younger players and developing the team’s talent, Tortorella did have a respectable amount of success in this area. Owen Tippett and Travis Konecny broke out in Tortorella’s first season, hitting the 20 and 30-goal mark for the first time in their careers, respectively. Noah Cates seamlessly transitioned not just to the NHL but to center that season as well. In year two, Travis Sanheim took the best strides, with Tyson Foerster earning down-ballot Calder and even Selke Trophy votes. Before his removal, Cates was enjoying a productive season, and Bobby Brink was taking a step forward in his eyes.
But the problem was that few players consistently built on their success. Konecny looked to be doing so before a wretched slump that held him back for the first two and a half months of 2025. Sanheim went 40 games between goals. Tippett is closer to a 20-goal scorer than a 30-goal scorer this season. Cates’ stock fell so far in 2023-24 that he was a frequent healthy scratch early this season. Foerster is more or less treading water. And that’s not even mentioning Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee, first-round picks who were traded for a second-round pick and two players who are around third-line caliber, or York, who did have a strong 2023-24 season but a relationship with Tortorella that completely fell apart by the end.
As for the all-important Michkov, it will be tough to measure Tortorella’s influence because of how little time he played under him. Tortorella certainly didn’t ruin Michkov; even though he’s been hot since the coaching change, he was three points and one goal away from first place in the rookie rankings when Tortorella was axed. At that point, he also led all regular Flyers forwards in expected goals share, so it’s not like he was an empty-calorie scorer. But it’s fair to say that Tortorella’s tight style hurt his Calder Trophy odds. While long-term development is more important than being rookie of the year, there’s no guarantee this approach will create a worthwhile trade-off.
Briere vs. Tortorella
Before last week, the perception was that while Briere and Tortorella may not agree on every decision, they were in lockstep with the general view of developing the organization. Parting ways with the coach shows that the alignment between perception and reality wasn’t straight.
“We both have opinions, and it doesn’t mean that mine is better than his,” said general manager Daniel Brière. “I don’t want to get into that. But we had some different opinions on different things.”
However, here’s the thing — since Tortorella is now gone, Briere’s opinions need to be better than his former coach’s. If they’re not, that means he will be proven too optimistic about the talent on hand and either fail to adequately improve the roster or hurt the team’s salary cap state by locking those players up (York is on the mind here given he’ll be a restricted free agent at season’s end). And while Briere didn’t dismiss a question that wondered if the team’s recent struggles were getting to Tortorella, he doesn’t sound like someone expecting another bottom-quarter finish next season.
“You look at the assets, the players that we’ve traded, those were the players that we felt it was time for them to go elsewhere when we got assets back. When I look at the team now, I feel good that those are the guys that will help us moving forward… I’m
not saying that next year we’ll take a huge step forward. It’s going to be small steps, the patience part is the hardest part of a rebuild. But I feel at this time, it’s rock bottom,” said Briere.
It’s interesting to hear Briere preach patience after making what is, at minimum, not the most patient course of action. The Flyers can be better under Tortorella. After all, they were just last season. So this doesn’t seem to be about Tortorella getting the Flyers back to where they were; it’s about taking them somewhere new. And evidently, Briere (and Keith Jones and Dan Hilferty) didn’t think he was the best person to lead them there.
“Torts is a complicated man, a complicated coach. He’s a blast to work with because he challenges you. I truly believe he made me a better GM,” Brière said.
The Challenge Ahead
It would be great if Brière is right about Tortorella helping him improve, because a big offseason awaits as his second season running the team winds down. He’s got eight picks in the first two rounds to work with, three important RFAs to make decisions on (York, Foerster, and Cates), and a remaining gaping hole at first-line center. And he’ll need to hire a head coach for the first time, too. Most GMs only get to do that twice, maybe three times at most. Suffice it to say a lot is riding on that.
Related: Flyers’ Matvei Michkov Proving He’s One of the NHL’s Brightest Minds
Tortorella was long framed as a key part of the “triumvirate of leadership” that would lead the Flyers into a new era of greatness. His absence means two things. Either the new coach will replace his influence, or that burden will shift onto the shoulders of the remaining two pieces. Figuring out how and who to assign that pressure will be key to ensure the progress made under Tortorella, whether because of or despite him, won’t be lost.
