John Tortorella compares Morgan Frost to toilet seat

Nov 29, 2022 - 4:22 PM

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Hockey coaches and hockey people love analogies. Whether it’s some comparison of players to soldiers on a battlefield, slippery reptiles, or any other conclusion they want to make to drive their point home. But, it is not often that you hear a coach talk about a player and compare them to a plumbing appliance.

Philadelphia Flyers head coach John Tortorella did exactly that before Tuesday’s game against the New York Islanders.

When asked just how he can improve this team’s puck possession and general play throughout the lineup, he gave a clear enough answer on how to develop some of these talents.

“It’s skill, we’re talking about skill,” Tortorella said. “Offense you can manufacture and go through some of your systems to manufacture offense, but when it’s a God-given skill, it’s kind of up to the player to develop. And we’re just going to try to keep putting — especially now with the injuries — we put them in those opportunities and see if they get more comfortable.”

One of those players given more opportunity because of the immense number of injuries in the Flyers lineup is young center Morgan Frost. And as with most highly touted forwards that haven’t exactly found a secure spot in the NHL yet, he has some good performances and some other not-so-good performances.

For Tortorella, to really hit home the point that Frost’s game-by-game play is a little erratic, he decided to pull an analogy from seemingly out of nowhere.

“You look at Frosty, I still think he’s up and down like a toilet seat here, as far as you see him coming, then he dips, and then you see him coming,” he said. “Hopefully, it levels out and keeps going in the proper direction, because he’s supposed to be a skilled guy. You can see it’s there, but it’s still very inconsistent.”

Like, yeah, everyone understands the point that Tortorella is trying to make. But comparing one of your players to part of the thing that people defecate into, might not be the most confidence-boosting thing to do.

Maybe Frost just needs that jarring comparison to really shake up his game — we’re grasping at straws here. The 23-year-old center has just five points in the 21 games he’s played this season and in the last six games, where he saw a massive boost in minutes due to injuries, he has just one single point. Not the level of production you really expect from someone that you know can make some plays, but nevertheless, the seat of a toilet he is, apparently.

The toilet seat is going to be playing with Owen Tippett (the toilet handle?) and Kieffer Bellows (the toilet lid?) tonight, as the Flyers face the New York Islanders. Hopefully they can form a complete toilet and flush the competition.