The events that led to Flyers firing coach John Tortorella

It was only a matter of time, it seemed. As the season spiralled out of control for the Philadelphia Flyers, there seemed to be a growing thought that head coach John Tortorella may be in jeopardy of losing his job. Early Thursday morning, the clock struck midnight on his time behind the bench. 

General manager Daniel Briere announced that the Flyers had moved on from Tortorella, just nine games shy of him completing his third season behind the Flyers’ bench. The Flyers will have missed the playoffs in each Tortorella’s seasons, marking arguably his worst coaching tenure in the NHL aside from his one-season stint with the Vancouver Canucks more than a decade ago. 

The Flyers brought Tortorella aboard following a disastrous 2021-22 season. After the trade of former captain Claude Giroux, the Flyers were ushering in a new era and needed a bench boss to instill a new culture. Hired by former president of hockey operations and GM Chuck Fletcher, Tortorella did just that in his first season, working toward building a brand new “era of orange.”

Even after a front office overhaul that saw Dan Hilfery, Keith Jones and Briere take over things, Tortorella was kept aboard the past two seasons. Having the backing of all three – especially Briere, who was part of the front office during the coaching hire – Tortorella was presented as one of the faces of the Flyers’ rebuild and kept aboard despite the regime shift in the positions above him. 

Tortorella did great things behind the Flyers’ bench – this must not be mistaken. For a team that had burned through four coaches in three years and was spiralling in a desperate attempt to find relevancy, Tortorella’s presence instantly made the Flyers a (once again) newsworthy franchise for the first time in years. The impacts he had on the growth in players like Travis Konecny, Travis Sanheim and Owen Tippett should not go unnoticed, as he positively affected several key players that will be part of the Flyers’ core for years. 

But all good things must come to an end, and that was exactly the case for Tortorella as the 2014-25 season began to wind down. 

In the bottom of the Metropolitan division and having given up seven goals in back-to-back games, the Flyers were in tough sledding towards the finish line. After Tortorella’s comments following the drubbing loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs Tuesday night, it was clear that things were taking a toll on the 66-year-old. While Tortorella’s comments were not the only thing that led to his dismissal, it was a series of things “over the last couple of weeks,” as Briere alluded to in his press conference ahead of Thursday night’s game versus the Montreal Canadiens, that contributed to the eventual firing. 

So what exactly got us to this point?

If we want to look at tangible, on-ice results, it’s hard to have asked any more from Tortorella. Especially after last season’s overachieving year that saw the Flyers narrowly miss out on a playoff berth, it is hard to argue that any other bench boss could’ve done more with the Flyers’ roster. Especially following the trade of defenseman Sean Walker and the injury to Rasmus Ristolainen, the Flyers being able to stay in the hunt until the final days of last year’s regular season was indicative of Tortorella’s positive impact. 

This year, the Flyers struggled to stay in the playoff picture virtually all season, having their post-season aspirations completely plummet during the turn of the calendar to 2025. Tortorella knew what he signed up for three years ago when he jumped on board, but the losing this year took a toll on him, one source told Daily Faceoff. The first year was a new challenge for him and weeding out the bad apples; last season was a positive surprise that saw the Flyers battle for a playoff spot in meaningful games down to the last game of the season. This year’s story was different, as the Flyers fell out of the playoff picture in the weeks leading up to the Trade Deadline.

Briere and management leaned into the rebuilding philosophy, moving on from roster players Joel Farabee, Morgan Frost, Erik Johnson and Scott Laughton to stockpile assets and draft picks with eyes on the future. While Tortorella publicly said he favored this rebuilding approach, it became clear that it was taking a toll on him.

According to a source, a series of consistent events since the Trade Deadline led to Tortorella’s eventual dismissal. Becoming increasingly combative with everyone in the organization, from management, to coaches, to players, to staff, Tortorella’s antics wore on everyone. While his comments following Tuesday’s game versus the Leafs were not the sole reason for his firing, behavior in that vein became far too common.

Tortorella did not step down – he was let go by the Flyers. But his behavior following the Trade Deadline led some to believe the third-year bench boss was almost looking to get fired, a source told Daily Faceoff.

As for what was the initial plan leading up to the deadline, it was for Tortorella to finish the season; beyond that, there were no guarantees he would be back next year. As for the ongoing rumors of him moving into a managerial position, there was never any validity to those talks, a source said.

Whether it be arbitrarily benching players like Sean Couturier last season or defenseman Cam York this season, or going to war with prized forward Matvei Michkov on more than one occasion, the losing clearly broke Tortorella. Yes, he was brought in to steer this team out of a rebuild, but in year three and experiencing a massive regression, there were clear signs that Tortorella was losing steam. He did what he had to do and accomplished what the Flyers wanted of him, but it was time for a change. A new voice was needed even though the underlying process was solid, and there wasn’t much more he could do with the below-average roster (and horrid goaltending).

As for his successor, Brad Shaw will take over on an interim basis, but I doubt that he will be the guy to run the bench when all is said and done. There has been early speculation about Canucks bench boss Rick Tocchett – who did interview for the job in 2022 when the Flyers hired Tortorella – but I think those conversations are premature. 

The Flyers are still committed to rebuilding this thing the right way as they sought out to do nearly two years ago, but it will be without the man who was hired in his position before all three of his bosses. 

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