Who is the Flyers True GM?

While nothing has been formally announced, and no official moves have been made there has been wide speculation that some time in the near future Danny Briere will take over as the organizations General Manager and Fletcher will be moved into a different role. Briere has admitted the team needs more high-end talent and needs to build better through the draft. Whether he'll be able to do that remains to be seen. However before John Tortorella came on board as the Flyers head coach, Fletcher was not necessarily agreeing with Briere's assessment. He was insistent this team was just in "re-tool" mode. He was adamant they weren't a rebuilding and with a few players added and a few coming back from injury they'd be contenders.

For various reasons this has not happened.

Since Tortorella's view of the team aligned more with Briere's previous assessment than Flethcer's. The head coach has been fully open about the fact this team is not a contender even while his boss was still extremely reluctant to admit it. Up until yesterday, Fletcher was still convinced - and subsequently trying to convince fans - that the team was just "re-tooling", and most of the issues stemmed from injuries to key players. The problem with his theory is other teams suffering injuries to key players were not falling apart like the Flyers had over the last several seasons.

While he still refuses to use the word "rebuild" essentially saying it's just a word the media likes to use, Fletcher has officially admitted the team is doing more than "re-tooling". He admitted the team needs to build through the draft and get "high-end talent".

Given the change in his pace, it's fair to wonder and question who's truly running this team? Fletcher is the one that will ultimately makes trades, waives players, and adjusts the roster through in-organization roster moves, however Tortorella did admit that he does get a say in the moves, which likely means other parties also have a say, such as Briere. Torts was quick to add that he doesn't deal with is the cap and other financial dealings that allow the moves to work within the NHL's cap structure, but he's in on every move Fletcher makes.

So it seems fair to ask if Fletcher just mimicking what Tortorella and Briere have been saying for months, or if he is finally actually seeing it for himself? We'll most likely never get verbal confirmation from anybody within the organization on the answer, but the way the team begins to shape up, or seeing the speculation turn into reality may be a very telling sign as to the answer to this question.