Some bad news from Philadelphia

The Inquirer and ESPN.com are both reporting the same story -- that Flyers center Jeremy Roenick will miss “significant time” after undergoing surgery last night for a broken jaw. Roenick was injured during the third period of last night’s 2-1 win against the Rangers at Madison Square Garden. After losing a faceoff in the defensive zone, Roenick was struck flush in the face by a point shot from Rangers defenseman Boris Mironov. It is estimated that he could miss the rest of the regular season. Roenick has previously broken his jaw, back in 1999 while with Phoenix, which caused him to miss 3 ½ weeks. Also injured in the game -- about half a minute later -- was center Keith Primeau. Primeau was skating through center ice, looking back at the puck, when he collided with Rangers’ center Bobby Holik. What at full speed looked like a knee injury and was thought after the game to be a concussion, is now leading Primeau to think he merely had his bell rung. It’s amazing to me find the Flyers at the top of the NHL standings, considering the endless string of injuries they’ve suffered this year. To have lost Eric Desjardins, Jeff Hackett, Robert Esche, Dennis Seidenberg, John LeClair, Radovan Somik, Donald Brashear, Primeau and Roenick for significant chunks of time and still win games is astounding. I suspect that the Flyers continued success during these injuries is the one upside from playing in coach Ken Hitchcock’s defense-first system; players are sparkplugs that are switched in and out of the lineup interchangeably, with the same results expected no matter who happens to be playing. On a final note, I can only hope that GM Bobby Clarke doesn’t feel the need now to sacrifice even more good young players to get a well-past-his-prime center to fill the void left by the Roenick and Primeau injuries. Please, Bobby -- don’t pick up that phone and call anyone.