On the ride from the airport to my hotel in Philadelphia, I mentioned to the driver that I was going to the Flyers game the following night. His response included both excitement and a warning.
“The crowds get really rowdy there,” he said. “You’re going to love it.”
It was true. The “brotherly love” for which the city is nicknamed does not exist inside the professional sports stadiums, apparently.
As the PA announcer declared the names of each player in the Utah Mammoth’s starting lineup, the fans chanted “sucks” in unison; Each time the Flyers failed to score on the power play, they got booed; Even the mites hockey game between periods was gritty — there were several unjust hits and one pair of players exchanged headshots.
That identity goes back generations. Intimidation is woven into the fabric of the Philadelphia Flyers organization.
Shortly after joining the league as an expansion team in 1967, the Flyers brought in the likes of Dave Schultz, Bob Kelly and André Dupont. They’re some of the players responsible for hockey’s reputation as a violent sport.
You won’t find those guys on any top scorers lists, but they’re all in record books for their quantity of penalty minutes.
Before long, the Flyers were back-to-back Stanley Cup champions. Whereas most teams got by on skill with a bit of toughness, the “Broad Street Bullies” simply intimidated their opponents into submission.
If you touched their top scorers, you’d have to answer to a flurry of fists.
The fans took to it. Compared to their inaugural season, the team’s attendance nearly doubled by Year 7, and the players reflected the city in terms of hard work and an unapologetic tendency.
The game of hockey has changed since the 1970s. While you might see a fight once every few games, the medical staffs’ suture kits don’t get nearly as much use anymore.
But the Flyers still embrace that blue collar, hard-nose mentality.
“I think when you have such a strong fan base, big hockey market like here and you hear the cheers after a big hit or a physical play and guys sacrificing themselves for the team and you get some cheers from the fans, it (encourages) you to play that way,” Flyers captain Sean Couturier told the Deseret News.
“This city’s a big sports town — really supportive toward their sports. They expect success. They expect a winning culture, and I think it all starts with hard work and dedicating yourself to the team."
Nic Deslauriers is the only active NHLer with more than 750 penalty minutes and fewer than 740 games played. The Flyers traded him to the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday, but on Thursday, he told the Deseret News how different it is to fight in Philadelphia compared to his four previous NHL stops (Buffalo, Montreal, Anaheim and Minnesota).
“It’s great,” he said. “Obviously this year I haven’t been on the ice that much, but the last home game when I fought, (it) was electric. The fans like it and I like it, too.”
What does it take for a franchise to build an identity?
As the NHL’s newest franchise, the Mammoth have the opportunity to build a long-lasting identity, just like the Flyers did nearly 60 years ago.
It won’t likely be the tyrannical bullying upon which the Flyers founded their franchise — Utah’s fans get excited for fights, but the population isn’t nearly as aggressive as that of the East Coast.
Instead, their identity — at least for now — seems to be pace. They are no lower than sixth in any of the player speed categories that the NHL tracks, and with Logan Cooley — who’s in the literal 99th percentile in maximum skating speed — signed until the end of 2034, that’s a great place to begin.
But the responsibility for cultivating an identity rests upon the fans just as much as it does on the players. My hotel shuttle driver, and hundreds of thousands of Philadelphians like him, love the local sports teams because they can see themselves reflected in the athletes.
That’s what the Mammoth need to look for as they build their identity. It’s an ongoing process. As GM Bill Armstrong said on Friday, “Our best team’s not here yet, but it will be shortly.”