John Tortorella Makes It Abundantly Clear That He "Doesn't Give A Shit" About Cutter Gauthier Playing His First Game Against The Flyers
It's hard to believe that it was just under a year ago that the whole Cutter Gauthier saga went down. Gauthier had just Team USA to a gold medal at the World Juniors as the 5th overall draft pick of the Flyers in 2022. Flyers fans were so fired up watching this kid, and anticipated seeing him put on an orange sweater in just a couple of months after his season wrapped up at Boston College. And then a few days after the tournament, it came out that Gauthier cut off all communication with the Flyers and refused to ever play in Philly because he got his feelings hurt about not getting called up after his freshman season. So he was traded to the Anaheim Ducks in exchange for Jamie Drysdale before playing a single game for the Flyers. The rest is history.
It feels like a lifetime ago. And to be perfectly honest, it's been really easy to forget that Cutter Gauthier even exists over these past 11 months after the dust has settled. He struggled out of the gates, and certainly isn't lighting the world on fire in Anaheim. I'm sure he'll develop into a solid NHLer, but he's not doing anything that makes you feel like the Flyers missed out on a superstar talent after he quit on this organization. Especially not when Matvei Michkov has been so electrifying since coming over. Every time Michkov touches the puck, it makes it easier and easier to forget that Gauthier was ever a part of this organization.
So for Cutter Gauthier, this is an extremely awkward position for him to be in this afternoon. Now he has to play against the team that drafted him, put so much stock into him, and he returned the favor by throwing a tantrum and completely quitting on them. Even after the Flyers tried so many times to contact the kid to smooth things over, he acted like a child because he felt entitled and didn't have anybody in his life to hit him with a reality check. He received that reality check from Philly fans and media once the trade went down, and the city definitely sewered him on his way out. So now I guess he feels like he has some sort of "vendetta" against Philly.
But for John Tortorella? Well he simply does not give a shit about any of it.
This isn't a revenge game for Torts. This isn't any sort of rivalry game. This is simply a Saturday afternoon game in the end of December against the Anaheim Ducks. Nothing more, nothing less.
It's always tough to be a guy who circles a game on the calendar, but the other team doesn't even know you are.
Now here's the thing--while Torts may not give a shit about Cutter Gauthier or anything that quitter has to say, I'm sure there are some guys on this roster who are going to want to send a message to the kid about disrespecting the organization the way that he did. So I'm sure this game is going to have a few fireworks going off every time he's on the ice. There's never been a single Flyers vs Ducks game that has had any sort of significance behind it throughout the history of these two teams. Until this afternoon. Torts might not give a shit, but I'm going to go ahead and call this as much of a "must-watch" game as you could possibly get between two non-playoff NHL teams playing on a Saturday afternoon in December. See everybody at 4.