I’ve wanted to write this article for weeks. Well actually months, but we will get to that. Unfortunately, I just haven’t had the time to start contributing to HW Hockey at the level I wanted.

While my entry into the HW roster was a scratch for personal reasons, we’ve seen an injury requiring surgery for Kevin Hayes launch Morgan Frost into a much more important role.

Let’s make some things clear, the sidelining of Hayes hasn’t changed my position on where Morgan Frost stands and what he means to the Flyers organization. We should ALL be rooting for Morgan Frost’s potential to be realized – no other player on the roster has the puck skills he possesses with one exception, Claude Giroux.

No, I am not saying that Morgan Frost IS the next Giroux. But no other current player has the long-term potential to replace some of the key things that G has brought to the table with his vision and hands. We’ve all thought about how we could ever replace G – we can’t. He’s one of the greatest Flyers to play the game. But if we had a player that could give us 75-85% of what he’s brought, you’d think that would excite people.

Instead just two weeks ago, we were watching the Twitter world claim that Frost wasn’t big enough and didn’t have the work ethic to ever cut it. The lunacy dipped that low. There were voices calling him nothing but an AHL player. I won’t name names because they frankly don’t deserve the clicks. I will say it was refreshing to see both Bill Meltzer and Dan Silver sarcastically slam back.

No, Morgan Frost is not the next Claude Giroux. We have no idea how good Morgan will be but he certainly has the skillset to be a really good player in the league for a long time and if there’s part of his game that freakishly reminds of Number 28, why wouldn’t that excite us? Why wouldn’t we be looking forward to it?

It’s not just me, that sees the skillset comparison – it’s seasoned hockey journalists, broadcasters, and players that see the same things.

Joel Farabee on Frost: “His skating is really undercover. He’s able to use his speed and his edges to get away from guys and break checks. He reminds me a lot of G in a lot of ways when he has the puck. I feel like he knows where everyone is at all times. He has the skill to find guys. It’s almost like he has eyes in the back of his head at times.”

I repeat. HE REMINDS ME A LOT OF G in a lot of ways when he has the puck.

Nope, not my words. That’s a top-flight young player that is actually on the ice with Frost, not some keyboard masher looking to make the hot take. Players see it and hockey people see it. Jason Myrtetus, Dan Silver, and many others have said how eerily similar their skills are and how close their junior stats were. Yes, they had practically the same insane numbers in their 2 post-draft junior seasons.

63GP 48G 64A 112P          67GP 42G 70A 111P
55GP 38G 68A 106P          58GP 37G 72A 109P

Obviously, those junior numbers don’t mean anything in determining what the ceiling is for a player. No, it doesn’t mean that Frost WILL become the next Giroux, but it is a great indicator of where the baseline talent is and why it’s so absurd to denounce a young player as “never will be an NHLer” because “doesn’t work hard enough.”

There are other players that scored like that in juniors after all, but aren’t at the all-time status of Giroux. Tyler Toffoli is a guy that armchair GMs would have loved to see Fletcher bring to Philly. Heck, I wanted him with the O&B back when Hextall was still here. He would have filled a need perfectly back then. Toffoli also had a couple hundred point seasons in the OHL. But I guess the Kings should have given up on him because he didn’t go full time until he was 23. After all those “pretty alright years” once he did get to LA would have happened sooner if he simply would have worked harder.

Tyler Johnson is another 3C that fandom was clamoring for. While he didn’t play Canadian juniors and the U.S. numbers aren’t an exact correlation, he did have a 100 pt junior season in Spokane. And we’ve all seen his skillset on display for years. Let’s not mention how undersized he is, yet still managed to “work hard enough” to eventually make his way into the league and make some major impact.

Nobody knows if Frost will be 75% of Giroux or close to Tyler Toffoli or Tyler Johnson or what. But the idea that people as far back as the trade deadline were actively shipping off the best young center in the organization was beyond frustrating. I wanted to write out my manifesto then but didn’t have a place to air it other than shouting at the twitter forest. Damn that forest is dark at times.

Frost isn’t a bust.

Let’s also not act like this is somehow anything close to Patrick 2.0. Frost sure as hell seems to care more than Patrick did. According to Ian Lapierre he has actually worked extremely hard to get stronger and keeping his game as close to playing level as anyone possibly could.

He was the 27th overall pick for Christ’s sake. Laughton was 20th, it took him 5 years and he has nowhere near the level of upside skills that Frost has. Laughton after all, scored at roughly half the level that Frost did in juniors. Scott sure has done alright for the Flyers.

I know this is a hard concept for some – the majority of players actually take time to develop.

But these past two years has really amplified everyone’s perspective on history and time. Frost is actually well ahead of Laughton in his readiness at the same point in careers. Hell, Morgan played 20 games at 20 yrs old despite it being a shortened season. Then he won the 3C job outright after camp but was injured 2 games in after being moved to take over Cout’s offensive minutes. The idea that he’s somehow a bust is delusional.

Tyler Johnson went undrafted and didn’t go full time NHL until he was 23 yrs old. He did alright for Tampa once he got there. Tyler Toffoli was 47th overall and also didn’t go full time until he was 23. Yet he was pretty alright for LA once he got there. The point is that no one knows what a player is going turn into and actively rooting against the kid and making up blatant bullshit just irritates the hell out of me.

Seriously why are people rooting against this kid?



Instead let’s crack open some beers and enjoy watching Frost play in Fletcher’s newly crafted team. Let’s tune in and hope to see a ridiculous skilled play by Frost. Because they are coming.

I’ll probably be drinking a Schöfferhofer from an orange and black can. What will you be drinking?

Photography Credit: Heather Barry

Author: Tom Sloan

Follow me on Twitter @Majorly_Tom

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