{"id":686000,"date":"2026-10-13T18:39:17","date_gmt":"2026-10-13T18:39:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/686000\/"},"modified":"2026-10-13T18:39:17","modified_gmt":"2026-10-13T18:39:17","slug":"early-trading-is-rick-tocchet-feeling-the-pressure-in-philadelphia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/686000\/","title":{"rendered":"Early Trading: Is Rick Tocchet feeling the pressure in Philadelphia?"},"content":{"rendered":"

TSN Hockey Insider Chris Johnston joins Gino Reda to discuss the pressure mounting on Rick Tocchet with the Flyers off to their worst start in franchise history, the expectations on Connor Bedard<\/a> as he approaches his return to the Blackhawks, how the Leafs are dealing with Chris Tanev<\/a>\u2019s injury, and more.<\/p>\n

—-<\/p>\n

Gino Reda: Are heads ready to roll in Philly. Is Bedard back? How bad is Tanev? And what\u2019s the plan for future outdoor games? With the details on these stories and more, insider Chris Johnston. <\/p>\n

CJ, Flyers are winless in seven. Their worst start in franchise history. Is Rick Tocchet in trouble?<\/p>\n

Chris Johnston: Well, certainly the fans are trying to put him on notice. And with the pressure mounting there, I can understand the question. But at this point in time, the organization and those making those kind of decisions have no interest in looking elsewhere for a coach. And really, when they look at this difficult start to the year, they\u2019re looking at some of the best offensive players on the team all collectively in a slump. They only scored eight goals across those first seven games. <\/p>\n

That falls on guys like Trevor Zegras<\/a>. He\u2019s still a rookie, but Porter Martone<\/a> is part of this for the Flyers. And this is still a young team, one that took some steps last year, made the playoffs, got to Round 2. <\/p>\n

And I think it\u2019s fair to wonder if maybe that success in some ways, you know, everyone just thought it was going to carry over. But at this point in time, while I know all the questions make sense, I just don\u2019t see a coaching change being made. A drastic trade is not in the offing. <\/p>\n

I think that they believe they can figure it out internally. And you know, as time goes along, and if that doesn\u2019t happen, perhaps you\u2019ll see them make some moves to the roster. but at this point in time do not see a change at the head coaching position.<\/p>\n

Reda: Chicago Blackhawks<\/a> are also struggling out at the start of the season, but so far they\u2019ve been without their captain Connor Bedard<\/a>. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s the timeline for his season debut and what are the expectations when he does start dressing?<\/p>\n

Johnston: It\u2019s a huge shot in the arm for the Blackhawks as he\u2019s set to return on Tuesday against the Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a>. And look, there\u2019s no good way to dress this up. Connor Bedard<\/a> getting injured, getting shoulder surgery in the off-season was a tough blow for a team looking to take a step this year. <\/p>\n

We\u2019ve seen in their early play that they haven\u2019t been able to fare well without him. But this is a year where the Blackhawks do expect to take a step forward and they hope that Connor Bedard<\/a> can carry that attack. <\/p>\n

You know, it gets lost a little bit because he also missed time last year with a shoulder ailment. But he had taken a pretty significant step at the beginning of last season. And I think the Blackhawks believe this guy is ready to be a difference maker. <\/p>\n

And so this was not the way you would want to draw it up in terms of getting off to the right start, getting your franchise player in a position to succeed. But there\u2019s a lot of confidence about where Bedard is at physically, the work he\u2019s been able to do over the last number of weeks and really months as he went through his rehab and ramped up to his return to play. And there\u2019s a lot of high hopes for him in Chicago. <\/p>\n

They made some big moves this off-season, getting Patrick Kane<\/a> back, which is a symbolic move, but even acquiring Bo Byram and signing him to an extension. That\u2019s all done with an idea of having better players around Bedard so that he\u2019s ready to flourish here in his fourth NHL season.<\/p>\n

Reda: Chris Tanev<\/a> got hurt on Saturday. This is a guy who only played 11 games all of last year because of injury. The Leafs put him on the IR, which means he\u2019s got to miss at least seven days. What are you hearing beyond that, CJ?<\/p>\n

Johnston: Well they\u2019ve also provided a bit of a vague timeline, really no timeline officially in terms of what to expect from Tanev. And I think that that\u2019s raised some concerns in the market just because this remains an important part of the Leafs\u2019 blueline and because of what you mentioned last year, missing more than 70 games because of injuries. <\/p>\n

But at this point in time, I don\u2019t sense that it\u2019s super sensitive in terms of where Tanev\u2019s at. Really the Leafs are working through due diligence, doing some further testing on him. <\/p>\n

And I think this is going to be more of a standard for them when players get injured under this new performance staff. They invested heavily in bringing in some new people from the outside with the idea of obviously keeping the team healthier, but also working on the return to play format. And so with Tanev, it\u2019s not known exactly what that time frame looks like, but I don\u2019t know that it\u2019s one that you have to jump to conclusions and assume it\u2019s going to be repeat of last season. <\/p>\n

I think that there\u2019s a little more optimism around his situation that I\u2019m sensing right now than what he went through last year with multiple injuries.<\/p>\n

Reda: But CJ, even when Tanev is healthy, the Leafs\u2019 blue line, we\u2019ve all been saying they need some help, they need to bolster that blue line. Are there any indications that they\u2019re still out there shopping or maybe looking within the organization for somebody they could call up?<\/p>\n

Johnston: At this point in time, that seems like an internal solution type of thing. They called up Marshall Rifai<\/a> from the Marlies to step into the lineup. Obviously, Oliver Ekman-Larsson<\/a>, not at 100 per cent. He missed practice for them on Monday in Utah. And so they are weathering a bit of a situation here. But the Leafs feel they have the depth, I think, short term to get through these kind of issues. Now, bigger picture for sure. <\/p>\n

We\u2019re going to continue talking about them scouring the market for defencemen. It\u2019s really the one area of the roster that wasn\u2019t significantly touched, I would say, since John Chayka and Matt Sundin took over the hockey operations department. <\/p>\n

So, you know, I think this will be something that stretches over a period of time in terms of trying to look for upgrades and improvements to that blue line. But in the here and now, even with some of these injuries and with it to being a key person like Chris Tanev<\/a>, the Leafs seem to believe they can sort of push through it and get some results while they wait for him to recover.<\/p>\n

Reda: I was looking back in the calendar, it\u2019s hard to believe, but the league played its first regular season outdoor game 23 years ago. But has the showcase now run its course? Is it time to move on from it?<\/p>\n

Johnston: The fan interest, the sponsor interest says no. There\u2019s going to be a game next Saturday, Oct. 25 in Winnipeg at Princess Auto Stadium. That\u2019s between the Jets and the Canadians. Ticket sales have been very strong for that. There\u2019s an alumni event attached to it as well. <\/p>\n

And so there does seem to be a demand, certainly in specific markets for these types of games. But the one issue they have in Canada, the NHL, is that there\u2019s not a lot of venues to stage them at. In the U.S., they\u2019re taking a game to the Cowboys Stadium this year. They\u2019re taking a game to the campus in Utah for the Winter Classic. It\u2019s not as much variety in terms of available venues in Canada, but I do think there\u2019s still a desire for the league to have a Heritage Classic every second year. <\/p>\n

If you look at the rotation after Winnipeg 10 years ago, they ended up going to Regina where the Saskatchewan Roughriders play at Mosaic Stadium. I don\u2019t know if that\u2019s as appealing because it\u2019s not an NHL market for the league. So there will be a game next weekend. I think it\u2019s going to be a success for the league, but in terms of where the next one will be held, that\u2019s still got a TBD attached to it. Because you just don\u2019t have a venue, for example, in Montreal. <\/p>\n

I think that\u2019s somewhere the NHL would love to have a big outdoor game, but there\u2019s not a big outdoor stadium to play it in. And so the league is sort of navigating between some of those restraints and constraints. But there\u2019s definitely interest, I would say, to keep staging these events.<\/p>\n

Reda: All right, that\u2019s the early version of Insider Training. The full version with CJ, Pierre LeBrun, and Darren Dreger is coming up on the early edition of SportsCentre.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TSN Hockey Insider Chris Johnston joins Gino Reda to discuss the pressure mounting on Rick Tocchet with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":686001,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4759,5,4],"class_list":["post-686000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-apple-news","tag-hockey","tag-nhl"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/117435063542613813","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686000","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=686000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/686001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=686000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=686000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=686000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}