No Foppa This Year

According to all reports, Peter Forsberg will not return to the NHL this year.

All through this process I believed that Forsberg was going to come back to Philly if he was going to go anywhere. The Flyers treated him really well when he was here and he enjoyed living in the city. Furthermore, there is nothing an aging hockey player enjoys more than the easier travel schedule playing in the Eastern Conference gives you.

That Forsberg is not coming back does shock me (such a big fuss was kicked up, afterall), but at the same time, I'm a little relieved.

The Flyers, right now, do not have the infrastructure in place to have a player like Forsberg simply parachute onto the scene and not screw up the rebuilding process for this team. All things being equal, if the Flyers were playing consistently and their main weakness was needing a forward who could play the power play and take a big faceoff, I'd have been more enthusiastic about Forsberg.

But the fact is, this team needs help on defense. They have some skill at forward (even with the injuries); they need someone on defense to get them the puck. That is where their bigger needs lie.

Maybe if the Flyers somehow get a Dan Boyle for this year and sign him long term, maybe Forsberg gets better over the summer and you look to have him back starting in training camp; just not right now.

(NOTE: I am breaking my unofficial one post per day policy today, when I should have a Phillies post up by 1pm. As I said yesterday, I'm Flyer'd out right now and won't post about them until tomorrow.....that is, unless they make a big trade.)