Okay, but this is the sort of thing you need to be willing to tolerate if you want to land a coach who makes the playoffs once every eight years or so.
This is important to remember when people say stuff like “Michkov is hurting himself. He needs to be better. He came to camp out of shape.” etc.
The coach is playing him *in the wrong position.*
Its such a flyers thing to do tbh. One of the best prospects we have had with insane offensive upside and we force him out of position while lowering his minutes and use the excuse of he came into camp out of shape. The moment we signed toc real fans understood this is exactly what was going to happen. This is no different from torts and his healthy scratch bullshit so MM can better his defense even though at the time he was 2nd on the team in points and leading all rookies. This is what happens when you go with old school dumb coaches that refuse to adapt.
Its pretty wild how much better Michkov looks when he goes back on RW. I know wingers dont get moved around that often, but its definitely the biggest difference I’ve ever seen. RW= future star. LW = AHL player.
It’s an absolute sick joke that this organization tried to sell us on Tocchet being the answer when EVERY SIGN said he was going to be a disaster.
My expectations were as low as they could be, and he still has found a way to be even worse than that. I am genuinely so curious how he has the entire hockey world seemingly on a string despite no coaching success to his name.
Why we hired Tocchet I’ll never understand, we just shouldn’t have fired Torts at this point.. I mean there’s barely a difference lol
The flyers are the browns/cowboys, it’s hard to make peace with it but I’m trying to.
You guys don’t understand! He needs this adversity early in his career. It’s going to make him better.
I tolerated Tocc and somewhat defended him when Zegras and some of the D were playing great. He was carried by that purely out of patience but now that’s faded and I’m debating boycotting games till this hockey terrorist is gone.
I don’t think this is a serious org while they still are trying to run with broad street bully mentality that is 25 years out of date with the league.
Mich is simply becoming a full “200ft player” instead of a “scoring player”.
if i don’t hear a reporter ask danny “why are you letting tocchet play michkov on the LW?” the next time he’s interviewed, i’m gonna lose it.
Tocchet is signed for 4 more years at $5mil. Since he is not going anywhere, they might as well trade Mich. He’s not going to be anything playing under this coaching
Tocchet’s contract is 5 x 5.
He ain’t going anywhere for at least two more seasons.
If the current approach to coaching and mentoring this player does not change he will be ruined by then.
Does Danny have the ability / gravitas to sit Tocchet down and dictate to him how he needs to change his approach? Is Tocchet self-aware enough to hear Danny and make the necessary adjustments in his approach or is he too obtuse and arrogant to do so with the knowledge that there is virtually no way that the team fires him so early in the term of the contract?
Forgive me if this sounds dramatic but I believe this is the single most important dynamic at play with the team right now.
It’s not normal or natural, he’s actively being suppressed. It’s not entirely on the coach, but this absolutely cannot happen to the development of a player who’s supposed to be the face of your franchise.
Paul Bissionette: “he’s just not that good”
It is frustrating but I don’t think it’s a binary choice -> Either he’s an elite first line rw who doesn’t play defense or a checking 3rd liner who plays lw. If we’re building around a window 4-5 years from now it’s worth taking a season to see if you can get michkov to play on his strong side and develop into an elite scorer who can also play reasonably well defensively and help break out through the neutral zone. I’m not defending anything just trying to consider the long view from the orgs perspective. If it continues to clearly not work and nothing changes for next year then that’s not good, but I think it’s still pretty early considering stated goal is not to compete for the playoffs yet. Obviously the risk is you piss him off so much the relationship is broken.
Imagine telling Kyle Schwarber hey you hit a lot of homers so now try batting with your opposite hand. It looks funny everyone laughs, but then the manager says ehhhhhh I think we’ll have you do that all season.
![[Appleyard] Last season, NHLFlyers Michkov:](https://www.rawchili.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/46yg6ca7sweg1-1125x1024.jpeg)
17 comments
Okay, but this is the sort of thing you need to be willing to tolerate if you want to land a coach who makes the playoffs once every eight years or so.
This is important to remember when people say stuff like “Michkov is hurting himself. He needs to be better. He came to camp out of shape.” etc.
The coach is playing him *in the wrong position.*
Its such a flyers thing to do tbh. One of the best prospects we have had with insane offensive upside and we force him out of position while lowering his minutes and use the excuse of he came into camp out of shape. The moment we signed toc real fans understood this is exactly what was going to happen. This is no different from torts and his healthy scratch bullshit so MM can better his defense even though at the time he was 2nd on the team in points and leading all rookies. This is what happens when you go with old school dumb coaches that refuse to adapt.
Its pretty wild how much better Michkov looks when he goes back on RW. I know wingers dont get moved around that often, but its definitely the biggest difference I’ve ever seen. RW= future star. LW = AHL player.
It’s an absolute sick joke that this organization tried to sell us on Tocchet being the answer when EVERY SIGN said he was going to be a disaster.
My expectations were as low as they could be, and he still has found a way to be even worse than that. I am genuinely so curious how he has the entire hockey world seemingly on a string despite no coaching success to his name.
Why we hired Tocchet I’ll never understand, we just shouldn’t have fired Torts at this point.. I mean there’s barely a difference lol
The flyers are the browns/cowboys, it’s hard to make peace with it but I’m trying to.
You guys don’t understand! He needs this adversity early in his career. It’s going to make him better.
I tolerated Tocc and somewhat defended him when Zegras and some of the D were playing great. He was carried by that purely out of patience but now that’s faded and I’m debating boycotting games till this hockey terrorist is gone.
I don’t think this is a serious org while they still are trying to run with broad street bully mentality that is 25 years out of date with the league.
Mich is simply becoming a full “200ft player” instead of a “scoring player”.
if i don’t hear a reporter ask danny “why are you letting tocchet play michkov on the LW?” the next time he’s interviewed, i’m gonna lose it.
Tocchet is signed for 4 more years at $5mil. Since he is not going anywhere, they might as well trade Mich. He’s not going to be anything playing under this coaching
Tocchet’s contract is 5 x 5.
He ain’t going anywhere for at least two more seasons.
If the current approach to coaching and mentoring this player does not change he will be ruined by then.
Does Danny have the ability / gravitas to sit Tocchet down and dictate to him how he needs to change his approach? Is Tocchet self-aware enough to hear Danny and make the necessary adjustments in his approach or is he too obtuse and arrogant to do so with the knowledge that there is virtually no way that the team fires him so early in the term of the contract?
Forgive me if this sounds dramatic but I believe this is the single most important dynamic at play with the team right now.
It’s not normal or natural, he’s actively being suppressed. It’s not entirely on the coach, but this absolutely cannot happen to the development of a player who’s supposed to be the face of your franchise.
Paul Bissionette: “he’s just not that good”
It is frustrating but I don’t think it’s a binary choice -> Either he’s an elite first line rw who doesn’t play defense or a checking 3rd liner who plays lw. If we’re building around a window 4-5 years from now it’s worth taking a season to see if you can get michkov to play on his strong side and develop into an elite scorer who can also play reasonably well defensively and help break out through the neutral zone. I’m not defending anything just trying to consider the long view from the orgs perspective. If it continues to clearly not work and nothing changes for next year then that’s not good, but I think it’s still pretty early considering stated goal is not to compete for the playoffs yet. Obviously the risk is you piss him off so much the relationship is broken.
Imagine telling Kyle Schwarber hey you hit a lot of homers so now try batting with your opposite hand. It looks funny everyone laughs, but then the manager says ehhhhhh I think we’ll have you do that all season.