Philadelphia Flyers: Claude Giroux is set to bounce back this season

It is not time to count out the Philadelphia Flyers’ captain just yet.

No matter how you wanna swing it, the 2019-2020 season was an absolute success for the Philadelphia Flyers organization.

A fantastic regular season that saw the team go 41-21-5 before the COVID-19 stoppage, followed by winning their first playoff series in nearly a decade; there is certainly a lot to be excited about moving forward for the orange and black. All of this was accomplished with their captain and franchise player Claude Giroux technically suffering through his worst season since his rookie year.

53 points (21 goals 32 assists) in 69 regular season is certainly not a bad season, but when compared to previous seasons from the Flyers captain, it is a step back. This “poor” play carried into the post-season, where Captain Claude was completely snake bitten. Eight points (one goal and seven assists) in sixteen games left the Philadelphia faithful clamoring for more from number 28.

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This poor showing (along with the rest of the Flyers offense) left the orange and black vulnerable and inevitably was their demise in a second-round exit in seven games to the New York Islanders.

While this was disappointing and left many wondering if this was the downfall of the soon to be 33-year-old captain, I am here to tell you to pump the brakes a bit; Giroux still has some gas left in the tank. While his point production was significantly down, this was largely due to a slow first half from Giroux last season.

Through the Flyers’ first 46 games, the captain produced 31 points (13 goals, 18 assists.) Over the final 23 games of the regular season, Claude Giroux produced 22 points (eight goals, 14 assists) and carried the orange and black to a 17-5-1 record over that span, propelling them towards the top of the Eastern Conference.

While those numbers paint a story of a player stepping up when his team needed him most, they are only part of the equation. Claude Giroux’s advanced stats show how good he was (and still is) for this Philadelphia Flyers team. Believe it or not, he posted the best Corsi+ even-strength numbers of his career at 55.8 percent. For those unaware of what this stat signifies, essentially anything over 50 percent means your team carried the play with this player on the ice. The higher this number is, the more your team is controlling the game.

Claude Giroux did all of this while beginning only 45.1 percent of his shifts in the offensive zone (a career-low) and 54.9 percent of his shifts beginning in the defensive zone (a career-high). So what does this tell us? That the Flyers were not relying on Giroux as much offensively as they have had to in previous seasons. This is due to the fact that after what has seemingly been forever, the orange and black are littered with offensive talent, which in turn lessens the pressure of G having to carry this hockey club.

Posting stats do not tell the whole story, and even then, Giroux was on pace to score 25 goals and dish out 38 assists for a total of 63 points over an 82 game season. Those 25 goals? They would have matched the third-highest number of his career. The assists will come, as well. I attribute this to not being relied on in the offensive zone as much.

There is no denying the poor post-season from the captain, but keep in mind; the entire Philadelphia Flyers roster felt like they were stuck in quicksand at times during their post-season run. I do believe a lot of this can be attributed to the two teams they played, being the Montreal Canadians and those pesky Islanders. Both of these teams play a defensive style game, and once they get out to a lead, they just sit back and play the trap; forcing teams into mistakes. Certainly not the best match-up for anybody.

Personally, I have not given up hope for Claude Giroux to bounce back this upcoming season; and neither should you. I fully expect number 28 to come out hungrier than ever, as it now appears this team is finally set to legitimately compete for a Stanley Cup. The idea of this guy being washed up is overblown; now he just needs to come out and prove it.