Is Rick Tocchet a 'Quitter'? New Flyers Coach Understands Heavy Backlash

Flyers head coach Rick Tocchet saw his chance in Philadelphia and took it at the expense of the Canucks. (Photo: Bob Frid, Imagn Images)

After leaving the Vancouver Canucks and joining the Philadelphia Flyers a short time later, Rick Tocchet has been labelled a quitter by his own former fanbase. But, is there any truth to such heavy criticisms?

Tocchet says he understands where Canucks fans are coming from, but it's not true. Not even close. And there won't be any such thing in his new masquerade with the Flyers, either.

"I understand it. I can explain to them I'm not a quitter, but I understand where they're coming from. Sometimes in life, Rick, you have decisions you got to make," Tocchet told Rick Dhaliwal in an interview on "Donnie & Dhali" Tuesday. "You hit the crossroads and you gotta go right or left. Sometimes, you make the right decision and sometimes you don't. You got to go with your conviction.

"It wasn't a quit thing. It was just something I felt, for me, to evolve and just in my life, this was the right decision. And there's other things, I'm not going to dive into it, but I just feel like this was the time."

Tocchet, 61, was technically out of contract with the Canucks, as Vancouver management had the ability to exercise an option to keep the former Flyers star behind their bench for one more year but decided against it, so as to not hold him hostage there, so to speak.

The two sides were going to come to a complete agreement one way or another, and it ultimately lead to Tocchet spurning the Canucks for a future with the Flyers.

"But I understand. They're a passionate fanbase, they want a winner," Tocchet continued. "You want to be in a pressure cooker, because if you can win in that town, the rewards are just... If you won the Stanley Cup, of all the 32 teams, I would say the top three or four cities, Vancouver is in one of them if you won the Stanley Cup. How they would react in the celebration, the aura, I just can't even put it into words. We went to the second round, Game 7, I couldn't believe what I saw inside the city. I couldn't even imagine winning a Stanley Cup there. I couldn't imagine it."

A classy move from Tocchet, praising the city of Vancouver as its loudest fans are online bashing him at almost every turn on the heels of a lost 2024-25 season that came apart at the seams to no fault of his own.

One fan, in the replies to the clip posted by Dhali & Donnie, called Tocchet a "total quitter" and then asked, "What the hell are we doing here?"

"He quit and ran to the lowest pressure job he could find," added another.

Some fans found the words and the compassion to praise Tocchet and wished him luck with the Flyers, but the sentiment was largely negative on that side.

Moving forward, Tocchet will be tasked with developing the Flyers' top young talents and attracting key free agents and potential trade chips down the line. For a Flyers fanbase and organization that has been starved of playoff hockey - forget about the Stanley Cup... no pressure!

And, for what it's worth, piggybacking on Tocchet's comments about the reaction to winning in a city, Philadelphia is probably atop that list. The Flyers haven't won in 50 years, and they haven't come close since 2010.

For Tocchet, there's no running from the potentially volatile task that lies ahead.