Snider Has No Qualms With Bryzgalov
CITIZENS BANK PARK — He was Ed Snider’s prized possession. On Monday, he was an expensive, bundled up benchwarmer. Ilya Bryzgalov sat on the bench as Sergei Bobrovsky got the start in the Winter Classic with the entire hockey world watching.
Apparently, despite spending $51 million on a solution, there are still goaltending problems. Even Bobrovsky’s 30 saves weren’t enough to win. But Snider was OK with having the hot hand out there and shrugged off any thought of a goalie controversy.
“We have two goalies and one was playing better than the other coming into the game, he won the start,” said Snider. “It’s not a big issue, we’re a team with two good goalies that will work out whatever issues they have and we’ll be in good shape.
“There’s no issue, we have no issue. We have two good goalies, we’ll be fine. We’re fighting for first place, something must be working well. It can’t be that bad.”
When asked about Bryzgalov’s increasingly enigmatic speech and odd behavior with the media, particularly his comedy routine on HBO’s “24/7,” Snider was short, but not negative about how he felt about his franchise goaltender.
“I think he’s colorful,” said the chairman. “He’s a colorful guy.
“I think that he’s a very good goalie. I think he’s going through a rough patch right now. Most goalies do. He’ll straighten it out and he’ll be better than ever.”
Surely it couldn’t have made Snider happy that Bryzgalov came out and emphatically announced to the world that he would be sitting out the Winter Classic, instead sitting on the bench with a thermos of “nice tea.”
“Those things happen,” said Snider. “I can’t let things like that bother me.”
The move to tell the media that better news was that “the team has a chance to win the game,” with him out sure seemed to bother Peter Laviolette. Even more so when Bryzgalov tweeted a picture of said thermos. But upstairs in the executive offices for the Flyers, everything is just fine with Ilya Bryzgalov.
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