You will see a lot of things on this blog upon doing some perusing. One thing you will not find is a series of love letters to the Philadelphia Flyers.

I enjoy the Flyers and support them just like I do the other three major teams in Philadelphia. However, it’s time for some sort of intervention for the hardcore Flyers fans.

Much the like the Eagles during the Andy Reid regime, the Flyers appear to be practitioners of the Groundhog Day method of postseason play. They lose the same way most of the time.

The team’s inability to find a quality goaltender is one of the most frustrating parts about following Philadelphia sports. Right on cue, it haunts them nearly every spring.

Few seem to get angry at this. Folks just trudge along about their business and wait ’til next year.

The Flyers normally receive some sort of non-declarative immunity card from fans despite routinely fumbling during the playoffs.

They aren’t alone. By my unofficial count, there are three Philadelphia sports entities that receive immunity cards:

1. The Chase Utley Immunity Card: Don’t get me wrong. Utley has been a rock for the Phillies. He had a monster World Series against the Yankees in 2009 but otherwise? His .243 postseason average includes five series where he batted below .200. Roundly criticized for his World Series performance  in ’09 and lack of production during the 2010 NLCS, Ryan Howard’s postseason average is 35 points higher with more RBIs (27 to 24).

2. The Buddy Ryan Immunity Card:  He never won a playoff game as head coach of the Eagles but loved beating bad Dallas teams. Andy Reid owns 10 playoff wins and a Super Bowl appearance. If Eagles fans had the choice of throwing one of the two off a cliff, Reid gets tossed first almost ever time.

3. The Flyers Immunity Card: The Flyers have lost six straight Stanley Cup Finals. During those games, their record is a combined 8-24. Yet, because they fight occasionally and have “muckers and grinders” their franchise is beloved in Philly no matter the circumstances.

Andrew Kulp of The700Level.com wrote a piece leading up to Friday night’s first round finisher, a 5-1 loss to the Boston Bruins, regarding the team’s plight over the season. He wrote a very telling paragraph:

They are, and have been, collapsing before our eyes. Worse, nobody can really explain why. It’s Chris Pronger’s injury. It’s the Kris Versteeg trade. It’s the lack of a true number one goaltender. It’s because this team has no heart. It’s everything. It’s nothing.

That sums up Flyers hockey for the better part of the last 36 years. With the exception of a few seasons (notably ’87 and ’10), someone could take that paragraph, cross out the names Pronger and Versteeg, and easily apply it to many winters and springs that passed since the last time Philly raised the Cup in 1975.

The same things happen to this team over and over and over and over again.

All the blame should not go between the pipes though. Poor defensive play, coaching mistakes, and a lack of production from star players  in playoff series constantly doom the Flyers.

Nonetheless, the goaltending is most visible and problematic aspect of what ails this team. The historical trail of this is long and painful.

Please refer to the Hextall/Snow debacle during the ’97 Finals, complete with bad goals from the blue line. Also, note Roman Cechmanek’s 2001 meltdown versus the Buffalo Sabres.

I’d like to add Bob Froese, Pete Peters, Robert Esche, the corpse of John Vanbiesbrouck, and Antero Niittymaki for further evidence.

To me, hockey goalies are like closers in baseball and NFL quarterbacks. You can’t afford to be wrong when evaluating those areas. It would seem the Flyers are routinely wrong in this area.

Through 11 playoff games in 2011, the Flyers made seven in-game goaltending switches and used three goalies during the postseason including Michael Leighton, who played in one regular season game.

Leighton should have received a restraining order from the franchise instead of another short-lived playoff run after allowing the Mister Softee special to Chicago’s Patrick Kane to close out the 2010 Stanley Cup Finals.

Hopefully, the diehard Flyers fans get angry for a change. Seeing some sort of resistance to the norm would be refreshing even if it doesn’t lead to the organization taking notice.

Perhaps my favorite sports-related Facebook status message of the year arrived Saturday morning from my buddy BK, who chimed in on the reaction of Flyers fans to the latest postseason debacle:

Wait. So the same city that hates McNabb for not winning a title over 11 seasons despite holding most of the Birds’ QB records, adores a hockey team with 29 playoff appearances since their last cup (36 years) and NOTHING to show for it? Hating the best QB in franchise history but loving a band of annual postseason busts? I will never let go of supporting No. 5. Never.

Well said. I don’t get it either.

If the Philadelphia Eagles lost six straight Super Bowl appearances and didn’t know how to evaluate quarterbacks, people would be waiting outside of Lincoln Financial Field with pitchforks and axes.

Flyers fans?

Nope.

As if they were programmed, they’ll be there again in the fall to dutifully root for their team as if none of this ever happened.