By Kevin Durso, Sports Talk Philly editor
The Flyers have their new GM in place. The team officially announced the hiring of Chuck Fletcher on Monday as the eighth general manager in franchise history. Reports surfaced earlier on Monday saying Fletcher had won the job.
Fletcher, 51, was in his first season with the New Jersey Devils as a senior adviser to Ray Shero. Prior to that, he spend the previous nine years as the GM of the Minnesota Wild.
During that time, Minnesota had a 359-265-80 in 704 games. The Wild missed the playoffs in the first three seasons with Fletcher as GM, but made the playoffs in the next six seasons. They were eliminated in the first round four times and the second round twice.
Prior to holding the GM role in Minnesota, Fletcher worked with Shero as assistant GM of the Pittsburgh Penguins for three seasons.
From 2002 to 2006, Fletcher held multiple roles with the Anaheim Ducks, including assistant GM, director of hockey operations and vice president of amateur scouting and player development. Fletcher was also an assistant GM with the Florida Panthers from 1993 to 2002.
Fletcher, who is a Harvard graduate and the son of Hall of Fame executive Cliff Fletcher, also has experience on the agent side of the sports world, working for Newport Sports Management.
Fletcher will now go to work on completing the Flyers rebuild. Goaltending and center depth were among the key topics of the interview process, so it’s likely to see Fletcher start making roster moves that improve the Flyers in the here and now. The coaching staff is also certainly subject to potential changes as well. With coaches such as Joel Quenneville, Todd McLellan and former Minnesota coach Mike Yeo all on the market, Dave Hakstol’s fate out of this scenario is fully in question and up to Fletcher moving forward.
Some of those decisions could come in a matter of days or several weeks from now after Fletcher settles into the role. But with a new GM in place, the changes could be far from over.