GM Chuck Fletcher has 'blank check' to fix Flyers

The Philadelphia Flyers hired Chuck Fletcher as their general manager on Dec. 3, 2018, and the organization qualified for the playoffs the subsequent season but missed the postseason tournament for 2020-21. 

Things have only gone from bad to worse for the Flyers since last spring. They parted ways with head coach Alain Vigneault during a painful losing streak in early December, and Fletcher committed to keeping Mike Yeo as interim coach for the remainder of the current season on Tuesday, just hours before Philadelphia dropped its 13th consecutive contest to cement its last-place status in the Metropolitan Division standings. 

Despite the overall state of the Flyers in the final full week of January, chairman Dave Scott backed Fletcher on Wednesday. 

"I like the way he's built this organization," Scott said of Fletcher, according to Adam Kimelman of the NHL's website. "I like his style. I like his leadership. He's smart, he's collaborative. … I think he deserves a shot to really right this thing. I'm going to give him a blank check. We're going to get this right, whatever we need to do."

Fletcher added during comments that captain Claude Giroux will have the final say on his Flyers status ahead of the March trade deadline. Giroux is finishing the last several months of his contract and is 34 years old but also has a no-move clause as part of his deal. 

"We're going to try to aggressively retool here," Fletcher explained. "Right now we're really focused on trying to win some games and get better. The math is daunting. So in view of that, if this continues, clearly we'll look to do what we can at the trade deadline to improve this team going forward."

The math attached to Philadelphia's record suggests Fletcher should do whatever possible to stockpile future assets over the next two months, and he vowed "to do what we can at the trade deadline to improve this team going forward."