Defenseman points the finger at Tortorella for his departure in Philadelphia
A few hours after signing a new contract with the Carolina Hurricanes, Tony DeAngelo decided to speak out on his tenure in Philadelphia and to try to explain his side of the story. Surprise, surprise, the disgruntled offensive defenseman didn't see eye-to-eye with John Tortorella.
The bulk of this story has surrounded Tortorella, a fiery, hard-nosed, and old-school head coach, but the problems transpired when former general manager, Chuck Fletcher, went out of his way to re-route the Flyers off-season plans to focus on DeAngelo being Ryan Ellis' replacement.
After a renaissance season in Carolina that saw DeAngelo chip in with 51 points in 64 games, while averaging a then-career-high 19:49 ATOI and holding a plus-30 rating, the Flyers believed he was their answer to the Ivan Provorov conundrum. It worked out decently in the first month of the season before the Flyers could no longer mask his defensive issues and he went from top-pair, to third-pair, to press box by the end of the year - being held out of the final stretch of the season.
After putting up 42 points in 70 games on an offensively starved Flyers team, many were wondering why they had him on the trade block before eventually buying him out. The Flyers had a deal in principle with the Hurricanes before the draft to send DeAngelo back to the Canes with salary retention, but it was nixed by the NHL, who claimed they were circumventing the cap as DeAngelo was originally acquired from Carolina less than 12 months prior.
The new front office are trying to usher in a "new era of orange" which has started with trying to right the wrongs of the previous regime - Kevin Hayes and Tony DeAngelo at the precipice.
DeAngelo spoke about how his checkered past had nothing to do with the split with his boyhood team:
"I've been bought out again, which is disappointing, but there were different factors that led to that a little bit. As far as controversy, I feel like that's all in the past. I guess there was some controversy this year, you could call it, just not being on the same page as the head coach. But there was no personal feelings, nothing personal happened or something big happened to lead to anything, it was kind of just a mutual disagreement on a bunch of things that I won't get into."
Now, heading back to Carolina, DeAngelo is excited to reunite with a head coach that he has a good rapport with:
"The way I got along with Rod is more than I got along with any other coach I've played for in my career. But that's the kind of guy he is and I feel like we were a just good match for one another, so just looking forward to getting back in that situation."
As much as people will point the finger directly at Tortorella, what is even more important is that the Hurricanes are a fantastic defensive unit. They had Jaccob Slavin, Brett Pesce, and Brady Skjei, among others, when DeAngelo was first there and have since added Brent Burns and Dmitry Orlov.
He went from being the 5th-6th option in Carolina to being immediately thrust as the 2nd best option in Philadelphia - a team not necessarily known for their defensive acumen. DeAngelo should rebound nicely now that he's back with Carolina.
