The recent death of longtime Phillies catcher Darren Daulton has hit me hard. I never met the man but, from all accounts, he was a fundamentally decent if sometimes troubled person. I certainly admired the way he played the game and respected his perseverance during an arduous path to stardom. Some of his missteps off the field played out all too publicly, but he ultimately emerged with his dignity intact.
Daulton's career legacy will be one of a hard-nosed player who stoically battled a myriad of injuries and became a team leader. His name will always be recalled fondly in Phillies history. On an emotional level, his memory will be held fondly by his many friends and a generation of
Phillies fans.
Contrary to the many published career retrospectives this week that gush about how Daulton was always a beloved player among Phillies fans, he was actually a player who was treated brutally for the first half of his career. As a young player, he annually hit around .200 with modest power as he battled injuries. He was booed frequently and viciously by many of same people who later claimed they supported him all along.
How bad was it for Daulton at the Vet? Once, an especially boorish group of Phillies "fans"
booed the player's baby boy at the team's father-son game.
Daulton's early treatment in the media wasn't much better. A local radio show once embedded a laugh track around audio of the Phillies hitting coach opining that things would eventually click for the lefthanded batter. Daulton's frequent in-game tendency early in his career to hit balls of the facing of the upper deck -- but 30 to 50 feet into foul territory -- would be corrected in time.
A few years later, no one was "laughing" anymore. Starting with a breakout individual season in 1992 (hinted at during an excellent second half in 1990) and especially during the 1993 team's improbable run to Game 6 of the 1993 World Series, Daulton emerged as a star. Suddenly, he became a local folk hero.
.
Daulton could have thrown the lack of support he received in his early years back in people's faces when he later at the top of his game and the Phillies caught lightning in a bottle in 1993. He never did, though, and that was to his credit.
When I brought this up on Facebook the other day, someone commented that the fans simply evolved along with Daulton and once a Philadelphia athlete wins over the fans, the loyalty is unquestionable. That's a nice notion, but the truth is that sports fans can be a fickle lot. That's hardly exclusive to Philadelphia but, for whatever reason, the loudmouth and boor contingent in Philly -- often fancying themselves tough and knowledgeable -- often seem to happiest being unhappy and proudly ignorant.
A vocal contingent of Flyers fans turned on an injured Eric Desjardins in 1999 when he gamely attempted to play through an 80 percent tear of his anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee. The multi-time All-Star had the audacity to fail to perform to his accustomed standards. Go figure. In his 30s, Desjardins had to make some adjustments to his game. He eventually did it successfully to play effectively within the highly structured system implemented by Ken Hitchcock, but there were were rough patches in the early phases.
During this time, Desjardins was often labeled overrated, an overpaid underachiever. Since he wasn't the sort of player who publicly wore his emotions on his sleeve, he was also was called a poor leader by fans with an especially weak grasp on why he was held in such unanimous respect among teammates and coaches.
The truth of the matter is that, as players age and the wear and tear accumulates, they have to tweak certain parts of their game. That is likely the challenge that current Flyers captain Claude Giroux faces.
A big part of Giroux's game offensively has always been his ability to get separation from defenders. When he went through his hip-and-groin problems in the second half of 2015-16 and then struggled post-surgically most of last seasons, the most notable thing lacking in his game was the frequency of finding time and space to make plays or to close gaps when backchecking. This was much less of an important factor on the power play than at even strength. It was in the latter area where he particularly struggled, and it was compounded by being part of a team that struggled on the whole at five-on-five play last year.
By the latter portion of last season, Giroux had started to recover more of his accustomed capacity to gain separation with his skating but it was too late to rescue a down campaign. Come next season, hopefully his mobility will continue to get back close to where it used to be in the transition game but he will also need to do a better job at making adjustments. He's a smallish player who isn't going to bulldoze his way to the net but he can still do a better job of working his way back into the scoring areas around the slot with consistency.
This process takes time. At age 29 with 656 regular season games and 63 playoff tilts under his belt, Giroux has an accustomed way of doing things. It's not a matter of preparation or work ethic -- he has always been exemplary in these areas -- but some things that once came more easily to him on the ice have become more challenging as he navigates the long season. Much of it is physical but there is no doubt a mental component to it as well.
Why am I bringing up Giroux's recent struggles in the same context as the pendulum of fan treatment received by Darren Daulton and Eric Desjardins? It's because a contingent of fans have turned on the current Flyers captain after his stats have declined in each of the last two seasons.
Giroux has not suddenly become an unfit captain for the Flyers now because he can't, at will, regularly do things like he did in the 2012 playoffs against Pittsburgh (especially the opening shift of Game 6). He wasn't overrated when he a Hart Trophy finalist in 2014. For damn certain, he is not suddenly "content" with the Flyers being a non-playoff team.
The reality is that Giroux is a player trying to find some new pathways late in his prime. He may not currently still be among the top three to five forwards in the NHL. However, with more help around him in the supporting cast, he is far from finished as a highly effective offensive player. Giroux is simply going through what many other high-end players have at some point in their careers; a period of struggle (by his standards) followed by a period of adjustment.
Giroux cannot concern himself with fan opinion. As with Daulton and Desjardins, he's not the type to dwell on what anyone outside of the locker room sanctum thinks. Nor should he be. Fans will come around when the Flyers eventually return to contention. The prediction here is that while Giroux may no longer be the team's primary focal point by the time that process is complete, he will still be an important piece of the puzzle and a player capable of delivering big performances in the postseason. He has posted 62 points in 63 career playoff games.
There's nothing about Claude Giroux (nor Daulton or Desjardins) that suggests he's anything but a leader and a winner. If the what-have-you-done-lately segment can't appreciate what they have in the player, it won't be the first time.
Mike Schmidt was perhaps the greatest all-around third basemen in baseball history; a 12-time All-Star, three-time National League MVP and one-time World Series MVP. He spent his entire career in Philadelphia. Nevertheless, he got booed most of the way on the road to Cooperstown. Eric Lindros is the Flyers all-time points-per-game leader and a Hockey Hall of Famer but some to this consider him an underachiever. Randall Cunningham was a four-time Pro Bowler and Donovan McNabb was a six-time Pro Bowler, but they were subjected to as much vitriol as adulation from the fans. The latter even started out being booed by a neanderthal group of "Eagles fans" at the NFL Draft simply because his name wasn't Ricky Williams.
Giroux, who has been one of the top Philadelphia pro athletes of the 2000s and the Flyers best player of the 2010s, is in good company. There will come a day when his name is raised up to the rafters as a member of the Flyers Hall of Fame.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
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