Updated: 5:50 p.m.
In late March, Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher opened a conference call with an acknowledgement and a message of gratitude for those working on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic.
"I just wanted to mention that before we started talking about the small piece of the world that I work in which is ice hockey," Fletcher said then.
Hockey didn't feel in the realm of importance to the world's current events at the time. Right now, it doesn't come close to the magnitude of the country's current events.
Fletcher and the Flyers respectfully postponed the general manager's scheduled media availability for Monday in light of what has transpired following the tragic death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. Floyd was killed in police custody after Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee into the 46-year-old black man's neck.
Starting on Saturday, joining others across the United States, protests focused on racial injustice began in Philadelphia and continued through Monday.
The Flyers released the following statement Tuesday morning via their Twitter account:
We don't have the answers, but this much we know ...
We believe in racial equality without exception, and our hearts are broken.
For Philadelphia and the nation, we join the chorus calling for justice, the elimination of systemic racism, unity and peace.
James van Riemsdyk, the Flyers' NHLPA representative who lives in Minnesota and is from Middletown, New Jersey, shared a message on his Instagram account Tuesday night.
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