The Flyers lost 7-2 to the Leafs on Tuesday night. It was grotesque in its tanking beauty, but Torts was bothered after the game:

Torts said this at the end of a one-minute postgame scrum. There weren’t any noticeable body language clues or whatever, he just seems like a guy who’s frustrated having to see out a tank to complete the season.

Which, if you’re paying attention, is exactly what this season was. “I’m not really interested in learning how to coach in this type of season,” but that’s exactly what the job entails. That’s what the last two seasons have been, and probably the last Chuck Fletcher season, Torts’ first, if we’re being honest. What – did you think this team was winning the Stanley Cup? The entire point of the “New Era of Orange” was to tear down Fletcher’s roster, disperse the stank cloud hovering over the franchise, and execute a proper rebuild to get this team moving in the right direction. As far as I’m concerned, they’re doing just that. They’re working in a group of young players while losing enough games naturally to ensure a high draft pick. This hasn’t exactly reached Sam Hinkie levels of shameless tanking.

Thing is, the pragmatic side of the Flyers fanbase was wondering from the beginning if Torts made sense for this job. You continue with a fiery competitor like John Tortorella… to oversee a full tear down and rebuild? Is he the guy you want playing the biggest role in the development of players like Matvei Michkov and Jamie Drysdale, Bobby Brink and Tyson Foerster? Torts always felt like an odd fit for the job, like going out and hiring the drywall guy to do your HVAC. Then the drywall guy punctures a hole in the HVAC line anyway, and you’re leaking coolant in a new construction Fishtown house, speaking from personal experience. The contractors have to do their jobs in a specific order to build the house, which, in this case, is a dumb way of saying that the Flyers are going to lose before they’re going to win. You can’t jump around and skip steps. This has to be done sequentially.

Maybe this Torts quote means something, maybe it means nothing. Maybe it indicates a coaching change at the end of the season. Maybe Torts goes upstairs to sit next to Danny Briere in the GM box. For what it’s worth, Brett Brown understood the assignment and soldiered on, knowing that he’d get an opportunity to coach a contender after emerging from the blackest darkness. Is Torts on the same path? Dunno.


EDIT – I changed up some of the phrasing because Torts was technically hired ahead of the “aggressive retool” season, which was probably year 0 of the rebuild if we’re being totally honest with ourselves