The '25-'26 Philadelphia Flyers thread

[Austinfan]

He had one season in the OHL after coming over from Russia.
At 16 he was at the Atlantic Coast Academy, which seems to be a hockey prep school.
65g 34-50 84. But this is probably HS level competition.

Most draft picks have 2 CHL seasons before the draft.
So he's a year behind his peers, a July B-day and one CHL season.
Which means there's more uncertainty, how would he have performed in his 2nd CHL season?

Flyers now have 3 big D-men prospects who combine size and speed, Murchison, Amico and Sokolovskii.
Don't think this is an accident, I think Briere wants his defensive D-men to be able to both get back to CYA on offense and to be able to skate the puck out of the D-zone rather than just throw it up the boards like the traditional defensive D-man.

[Austinfan]

Both Sauer and the 7th rd Finn are coming off injuries, PCL for Sauer, ankle for the Finn.
So they have very little draft season film, which means Briere is gambling that they were overlooked.
At that point in the draft, good gamble. Odds anyone after 100 plays 200 NHL games is like 10%

[LegoDoom]

And with that information you think he's going to get smaller and be more nimble. No, he's likely to get bigger and slower.

[jimbomill]

These kids are being ranked as 17 year olds

It true, but you can't laud someone as a 17 year old making the jump up to #40 and po-poo another ranked at #17. It's not consistent. A consensus was Lin was the better pick, you've seen the various rankings.
Also true that organizations rely on the traits they value most. So, along with most all of the hocky pundits' rankings who like Lin's upside as a 17 YO more, so did San Jose by trading up.

[jimbomill]

Flyers drafted 2 goalues...weird draft

throw enough mud on the wall and some of it may stick.

[jimbomill]

Odds anyone after 100 plays 200 NHL games is like 10%

Cool, I was wondering about that!
Any idea what the percentage of 2nd rounders playing more than 200 NHL games?

[dicemen99]

These kids are being ranked as 17 year olds

It true, but you can't laud someone as a 17 year old making the jump up to #40 and po-poo another ranked at #17. It's not consistent. A consensus was Lin was the better pick, you've seen the various rankings.
Also true that organizations rely on the traits they value most. So, along with most all of the hocky pundits' rankings who like Lin's upside as a 17 YO more, so did San Jose by trading up.

It’s not inconsistent. When someone jumps 80 to 90 spots in the rankings as a 17 year old in 3 months it signifies impressive development or growth in a very short period of time.

The teams are counting on a lot of development ahead for all of the players drafted, not just the ones ranked 17 or 40. They are only 17-18 year old kids. Some will develop a lot, some less so, some may have plateaued. They’re not 25, lots of runway.

You’re wrong. I haven’t seen a single hockey pundit write that they like Lin’s upside more, let alone all of them. Offensively , probably yes, but not in terms of impact He is obviously a better player right now, and well ahead in terms of being ready for the NHL. Sokolovoskii’s ceiling is super high but requires a lot more development.

Not sure the Sharks value his traits more either, this could just be they had less appetite for risk with the pick. The Flyers have certainly drafted like that before.

[VoteForKalas]

I think trying to predict the NHL career trajectory or production of a 17 yr old on the day after the draft is insane.

It is a gamble by the Flyers on a kid with unique size, reach and toughness along with some developed skills at a high value position.

Think of it like the Eagles do pretty often with freakishly large players at certain positions without much experience or developed skills. Now the Eagles have proven they can develop those types (Mailata for example). The Flyers still need to prove that so we'll see.

[Squire]

I really did have high hopes when Danny Briere got the lead role but at this point it just looks like the same old archaic thinking. Its nuts to me that Flahr kept his job when Fletcher was shown the door. The organization is run with the seriousness of a college fraternity the primary purpose of which is to provide lifetime employment to former players. But there is enough of a fanbase that loves the franchise and will fill the building without regard to whether they win as long as they hit and act tough. Making the playoffs last year was great but it required a historic collapse of their competitors and probably the best 2 month run of Vladar's career. There is far more evidence that draft expert consensus is smarter than the Flyers than there is of Flyers being smarter than the draft expert consensus. There is absolutely no reason to think that this year's pick will be any different than Jay O'Brien or German Rubtsov or any of the other times that fans were told to trust that the Flyers were smarter than everyone else. The fluffers always just say "well its a crap shoot" or "let's see how they develop" but when those guys are proven to be failures the fluffers never circle back and hold anybody accountable.

I really don't begrudge anybody from being the kind of fan they want to be. I'm not trying to convince anyone that they are wrong. Just that you won't convince me that I am. 50 years without a championship speaks for itself.

[Austinfan]

28%
400 games, 19%.

And that's a typical draft.
In a weak draft like this one, the odds are lower.

[Austinfan]

The Flyers under Briere (and give Fletcher credit for rebuilding the development side, from facilities to personnel, Briere has built up on that, Fletcher was a better administrator than hockey man).have a good track record developing players.

One thing I've noticed the last couple years is players promoted from LHV don't look out of place, many were marginal talents, but they've been well coached.

Players like Foerser, Brink and Cates improved their skating.
Bump made a big jump from last year's AHL POs (right out of college) to this season.

In hockey teams don't control players the first few years after drafting them, the Flyers stay in contact, bring them in the summer, but NCAA rules limit them as does the CHL season. One reason they're willing to gamble on Sokolovskii is he's with London, which is almost a pro team with Dale Hunter running the show - look how fast Barkey was able to make the jump to the NHL.College is better for development b/c they have more time to train and practice with half the games of the CHL, but young players don't get much PT which is why you see them stay in the CHL or USHL until they're 19 or 20 so they can play a lot of minutes against suitable competition (imagine baseball players starting in low A then going to college).

I'm withholding judgment on Jett, he'll get a chance to play in LHV this season, with intensive pro coaching and not jump around to 4-5 teams in a season. By spring we'll have a much better read on him.

[zambonir]

There is absolutely no reason to think that this year's pick will be any different than Jay O'Brien or German Rubtsov or any of the other times that fans were told to trust that the Flyers were smarter than everyone else.

Regardless of the guys they could have taken and didn't, is the Flyers' first-round hit-or-miss record really that different from any (better) organization? Maybe even.... good?

Past 10 years (uh-oh I'm making a list like AF): seven hits in Sanheim, Provorov, Farabee, York, Foerster, Gauthier, Michkov

Just two misses (Rubstov, O'Brien, but the latter was the lower of two first-round picks that year, after Farabee).

And of course, Patrick which I don't think anybody thinks of as a bad pick, just rotten luck all-around.

And for now we can say they hit in 2025, maybe not 2024 (which unfortunately seems to have also been related to the Gauthier trouble, avoiding Buium's agent. So that's another story!)

[Austinfan]

Buium has been pretty bad so far in the NHL, ok on the PP, not much at ES and horrible defensively.
76g 3-10 13 at ES, to put that in perspective, Seeler, on the 3rd pair and solid defensively, 4-6 10.
Now Buium is 20 but with two college seasons under his belt before he went to the NHL.

So I'd withhold judgment on the Buium v Jett decision for a few years.
Helenius has been better than Jett, but he was able to spend a full season in the AHL, whereas Jett bounced around last season after a solid performance in the AHL POs at 18.
Again, wait a couple seasons and see how they develop.

Flahr had nothing to do with Hextall's drafting, so we can ignore Rubtsov and O'Brien.
York, Foerster, Gauthier, Michkov, Jett, Martone, Nesbitt, Sokolovskii.

[jimbomill]

I haven’t seen a single hockey pundit write that they like Lin’s upside more,

I reckon I do not know what you've seen. However, San Jose seemed to like him more.
Rachel K from ESPN, a pundit, writes: There is a decent chance that San Jose walks away with two of the top five defensemen in the class when we look back at this draft years from now.

As for the Flyers, she writes: They left some value on the board in favor of drafting for organizational fit

[jimbomill]

I really did have high hopes when Danny Briere got the lead role but at this point it just looks like the same old archaic thinking. Its nuts to me that Flahr kept his job when Fletcher was shown the door. The organization is run with the seriousness of a college fraternity the primary purpose of which is to provide lifetime employment to former players. But there is enough of a fanbase that loves the franchise and will fill the building without regard to whether they win as long as they hit and act tough. Making the playoffs last year was great but it required a historic collapse of their competitors and probably the best 2 month run of Vladar's career. There is far more evidence that draft expert consensus is smarter than the Flyers than there is of Flyers being smarter than the draft expert consensus. There is absolutely no reason to think that this year's pick will be any different than Jay O'Brien or German Rubtsov or any of the other times that fans were told to trust that the Flyers were smarter than everyone else. The fluffers always just say "well its a crap shoot" or "let's see how they develop" but when those guys are proven to be failures the fluffers never circle back and hold anybody accountable.

I really don't begrudge anybody from being the kind of fan they want to be. I'm not trying to convince anyone that they are wrong. Just that you won't convince me that I am. 50 years without a championship speaks for itself.

Great post!!

[zambonir]

Buium was still a successful pick for the Wild already thought.

[zambonir]

York, Foerster, Gauthier, Michkov, Jett, Martone, Nesbitt, Sokolovskii.

How are you able to write out (and correctly spell!) the last name of our latest pick but never "Luchanko"?

[dicemen99]

I haven’t seen a single hockey pundit write that they like Lin’s upside more,

I reckon I do not know what you've seen. However, San Jose seemed to like him more.
Rachel K from ESPN, a pundit, writes: There is a decent chance that San Jose walks away with two of the top five defensemen in the class when we look back at this draft years from now.

As for the Flyers, she writes: They left some value on the board in favor of drafting for organizational fit

Upside, not projection. There is a huge difference. Nobody is arguing that Lin isn’t a better or safer projection to reach the NHL. Nobody.

The entire argument is that if Sokolovskii can continue the trajectory of his development that he has shown over a very short sample size, his physical attributes give him a higher ceiling than just about any defenseman drafted this weekend. That’s a big if, and most times it doesn’t work out. But that’s the gamble the Flyers took.

The Eagles traded up for Jordan Davis because of his size and speed, not his production, stamina, or technique. It took a while for that to work out but it finally did. It wouldn’t have been all that surprising if it didn’t, it didn’t look like it was going to happen.

[LegoDoom]

Jordan Davis plays a position where you are supposed to be huge. He's not covering small players who are much faster than him.

[dicemen99]

Jordan Davis plays a position where you are supposed to be huge. He's not covering small players who are much faster than him.

So you’re preference is for small defenseman - something the Flyers have in abundance - when virtually every GM in hockey is coveting a tall, rangy, physical presence to anchor the top pairing?