{"id":445420,"date":"2026-02-04T17:14:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T17:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/445420\/"},"modified":"2026-02-04T17:14:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T17:14:12","slug":"daniel-briere-says-philadelphia-flyers-matvei-michkov-isnt-going-anywhere-amid-coachs-criticism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/445420\/","title":{"rendered":"Daniel Briere says Philadelphia Flyers Matvei Michkov isn\u2019t going anywhere amid coach\u2019s criticism"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Philadelphia Flyers<\/a> have fallen out of the playoff picture during the month of January, with young star Matvei Michkov<\/a> taking the brunt of the criticism.<\/p>\n

Michkov, 21, has 13 goals and 29 points in 54 games this season, which is a nine-point drop after 54 games in his rookie year.<\/p>\n

The 5-foot-10 winger has seen his playing time reduced throughout the season, and head coach Rick Tocchet<\/a> has suggested that Michkov wasn\u2019t in good enough shape to begin the 2025-26 campaign.<\/p>\n

General manager Daniel Briere<\/a> gave his young cornerstone a vote of confidence on Tuesday despite Michkov\u2019s public friction with his head coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne thing I can tell you is Michkov is not going anywhere, let\u2019s make that clear,\u201d Briere told reporters on Tuesday. \u201cHe\u2019s going to be here for a long time. He\u2019s going to be a good player here for the Flyers, and what he\u2019s going through right now is part of the learning process.\u201d<\/p>\n

The disconnect between Tocchet and Michkov became public on Sunday when Tocchet joined PHLY Flyers Podcast on the concourse of the Xfinity Mobile Arena and questioned Michkov\u2019s fitness entering the season.<\/p>\n

The comments came after Michkov skated only 10:21 during the team\u2019s 3-2 overtime loss to the Los Angeles Kings<\/a> on Saturday, which was his lowest of the season. Michkov is averaging 14:34 of ice time this season, which is more than two minutes less than he averaged last year under head coaches John Tortorella and Brad Shaw<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve all talked about it, and I\u2019ll be very frank… Matvei did not come into camp in shape,\u201d said Tocchet on Sunday. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to play yourself in shape. I have not told him or any of our players to, \u2018Take a guy one-on-one, come out of the corner with a puck, or to make a play on a rush\u2019… He\u2019s having a tough time in those situations.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, I get it. Maybe [other players] don\u2019t have [his] skill set. But we\u2019re trying to get him to that level, right? How to develop him: practice, making sure that you\u2019re on time for treatments, and things like that. There\u2019s so much into that, the way you eat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adding fuel to the fire, the Flyers went 4-8-3 in the month of January and have fallen to sixth place in the Metropolitan Division with a 25-20-10 record.<\/p>\n

The Perm, Russia, native admitted in November that he put a significant amount of time resting during the off-season as he recovered from an ankle injury that was nagging him at the end of the 2024-25 season.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s something the organization was aware of heading into the season, but it doesn\u2019t change the fact that Tocchet has not felt comfortable leaving Michkov on the ice for longer periods of time.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Michkov] admitted himself that he wasn\u2019t in the best physical condition coming in,\u201d Briere said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be tough to catch up. He\u2019s in better shape than he was when he arrived this season. Unfortunately, everybody is in better shape than they were in training camp, so it\u2019s really tough for him to catch up with the amount of games that we have, the amount of travel we have. \u2026 He\u2019s going to do that in the off-season.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Tocchet\u2019s public comments towards Michkov were harsh, Briere believes that this adversity will help Michkov in the long run.<\/p>\n

\u201cRick Tocchet<\/a> wants Matvei to succeed,\u201d Briere said. \u201cHe wants to develop him to be the best player that he can be. Along the way, there\u2019s tough lessons that come with that. \u2026 Him and Matvei have a good relationship. Sometimes they are fiery. Sometimes when you\u2019re not winning, things are done and said. But they always come back to the table and they want the best for this team, and Rick wants the best for Matvei.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Philadelphia Flyers have fallen out of the playoff picture during the month of January, with young star…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":445421,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5112],"tags":[4759,1468,5,42774,4,1467,56,32987,5205],"class_list":{"0":"post-445420","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-flyers","8":"tag-apple-news","9":"tag-flyers","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-matvei-michkov-sports-hockey-player-player-nhl-api-8484387","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-philadelphia","14":"tag-philadelphia-flyers","15":"tag-philadelphia-flyers-sports-hockey-team-team-nhl-api-4","16":"tag-philadelphiaflyers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116013489668069865","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=445420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/445421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=445420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=445420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=445420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}