Welcoming the Flyers new AHL team: Tampa Bay Lightning

No seriously, look at the Bolts these days, all their Flyers related history. It's almost odd how the Flyers turned the Bolts into an extra AHL team, and how the Bolts kinda play like an AHL team these days too. I mean look at the Lawton/Tocchet era. Even the coaching staff currently has come Flyers connections. The head coach is some guy named Boucher, and as a long time Flyers fan, the name Boucher means a lot to me, mainly because he didn't totally suck this year when we needed him most, games 1 and 5 of the Finals not withstanding (don't worry Brian, I'll judge you based on the result of this series). Boucher's assistant, Dan Lacroix from the 1997 Dan Line of Dan Lacroix, Scott Daniels, and Dan Kordic.

The current Bolts line up features two Flyers rejects.

Let's see, when looking at future talent, the Bolts top agitator is Steve Downie, a guy who's so undisciplined and off the wall that even the Flyers wouldn't even keep him.

The blue line has former Flyer Randy Jones anchoring it's third pair, a guy so bad he lost his job to Ryan Parent/Oskars Bartulis.

Then I realized something, this Bolts/Flyers connection has gone back to the mid 90s.

The historical examples

• When the Legion of Doom failed, Mikael Renberg was sent down to the Bolts in favor of Chris Gratton
• When Gratton didn't help, he was sent down to give Renberg a 2nd chance
• Sean Burke made his way to the Flyers a couple times in his career, he too spent time with the Bolts when he lost his A-game
• Vinny Prospal got shipped between the Flyers/Bolts quite a few times.
• After Antero Niitymaki sucked for the Flyers, he was sent down to the Bolts.
• When Steve Eminger couldn't hack it in Philly, he was traded with Downie for Matt Carle
• Simon Gagne and Randy Jones now join those ranks.

As for the future, I've obtained some exclusive pictures of the future of these franchises.

Being sent down to the Bolts:









Being Called up to the Orange and Black







Ok, I shall wake up now and stop dreaming. (DTV, you can stop crying now this was work of fiction, please don't sue me)