Mike Richards is the Captain of the Philadelphia Flyers in the sense that he wears the letter 'C' upon his jersey. That is all. The real leader in that room, the one guys look to when the sailing get stormy, is Chris Pronger. For all of his badboy reputation Pronger is an Alpha Male's Alpha Male.
Richards comes off far too often as both a petulant brat with the media, and a guy whose play on the ice goes over the line and should not garner respect around the league. He makes too many borderline and dirty plays, then leaves his mates to clean up his mess and finish what he starts. He was also identified by his own team as part of a group of young players too focused on nightlife and not enough on gamenight.
On ice he has been involved in more than his share of questionable incidents, and yet he is never grouped in when 'dirty' plays are discussed. His hit on David Booth of the Florida Panthers was a carbon copy of Matt Cooke's infamous leveling of Marc Savard, both in intent, follow through, and results, yet nobody caused a fuss over it.
These playoffs Richards has been at it again, he was tossed from game four for throwing an elbow into the chin of an oncoming Patrick Kaleta of the Buffalo Sabres. An elbow to the head in "self defense" is still an elbow to the head. I don't know what Richards was "defending" himself from yesterday when he sent Sabres forward Tim Connolly face first into the boards. Another notch on Richards holster, and the league's overlords once again turn a blind eye toward the Flyer's head hunter.
The Flyers as a team meanwhile continue to hunt for a legitimate playoff goaltender. They started this series with the Sabres depending on rookie Sergei Bobrovsky, but after falling down 2 games to none have switched to some unholy combination of Michael Leighton and Brian Boucher. It has pulled them even with the Sabres at 3 games apiece, but it hasn't been pretty. Even if the Flyers do somehow survive this first round it is only a matter of time until this weakness in net comes back to bite them in the playoffs. Again.
The Flyers have invested way too much in Mike Richards to walk away from him, in contract term, length, and naming him Captain before he was ready to act like one. Where the Flyers have always short changed themselves is in net. And it continues to comeback to haunt them.
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