The New New Unending Flyers thread

[Austinfan]

Nah, I'm just not interested in repeating the last fifteen years, make the playoffs, lose in the first round, miss the playoffs, rinse and repeat.

If they continue to improve and make the playoffs, great, but I don't want them to make short-term moves that cost real assets (high draft picks, decent prospects) just to make the playoffs and lose in 5 games in the 1st rd.

A league average starting goalie would be expensive, a number of teams are looking for one.
I'd be happy with a veteran backup who could start 30 games and buy time until the young goalies are ready.

A top six center would be prohibitive, I'd only pay serious assets for an under 25 center with real upside who is a good fit, but I wouldn't be adverse to signing a 30+ center to a 2-3 year deal so they didn't rush kids.

[bigegypt0417]

So basically your way forward is tanking?

A veteran goalie to back up bad goalies?

Like I said...it's ok to admit you just want them to be bad.

Building intentionally bad teams is the way to see another 15 year's of this.

[LegoDoom]

Except G wasn’t going to sign another contract with the flyers so it was deal him or lose him for nothing in free agency. Plus it was rumored that Colorado had a better deal for the flyers but G preferred Florida and the Flyers did right by him

G had to approve any trade.

And it's false that he wouldn't have signed another contract.

[Docs]

He didn’t come back when his deal was up with Florida. He wanted to win a cup and knew it wouldn’t happen in Philly

[Docs]

If they continue to improve and make the playoffs, great, but I don't want them to make short-term moves that cost real assets (high draft picks, decent prospects) just to make the playoffs and lose in 5 games in the 1st rd.

I agree with this, the snider/clarke philosophy was sacrifice tomorrow for a better chance today, and that doesn’t work when you can’t outspend everyone to cover your mistakes. 100% agree with you here.

I think signing a Kevin Hayes like contract for a Kevin Hayes quality player was an anchor. Trading away draft picks or young players for 2-3 years on a vet is a mistake. Trading an offensive defender with draft picks for nothing only to trade for an offensive defender in exchange for more draft picks is a mistake.

I know what they shouldn’t do better than I know what they should do. I know they need a plan, and that the moves they make need to be consistent with that plan. If they decide they are going to tank another season i won’t be upset. If they decide they want to make a move for a young center who they feel can be a player to build around i won’t be upset. If they decide they want to sign a veteran center who compliments MM’s game i won’t be upset. If they make puzzling moves that contradict each other i will be mad. If they throw away all of their picks to sign a shiny restricted free agent who isn’t a good fit i will be mad.

The only prospects in the system that I'm truly optimistic about are the young goalies, the rest are JAGs. Some will compliment the team really well but i believe they need to find some young studs somehow.

I’d be excited if they traded up to a top 12 pick and got two players in this draft to be really excited about. We shall see.

[zambonir]

The Flyers' failures under Holmgren, Hextall and Fletcher since 2009 are only partly philosophical. They also frequently picked the wrong free agents or trade targets, drafted badly more often than not and just had a generally poor organizational culture that also led to emotional/reactive personnel decisions (something that started in the 88 era) and guaranteed few coaches would last long. The point is for this group to get it right in all three aspects of talent acquistion, not only do it one way.

And there are plenty of examples of teams hitting big on picks in the 20s, so: do that with at least one of them too. I still think it would be hard to do a two-for-one trade-up. My guess is still the extra pick either goes to '26 or does in a trade for a player. .

[Austinfan]

No. I've been in favor of patiently rebuilding, not tanking.

Like baseball, it takes 3-5 years from draft to NHL in most cases, Briere is in his second season and third draft.
This draft won't arrive until 2026-2029.

So there's simply no rush, Flyers are a young team getting younger, but they still have a lot of question marks when it comes to prospects even before this draft. What is the upside of Jett, Bonk, Brink, Pelletier, Bump, Barkey, Grebenkin, Drysdale, Andrae, Grans, McDonald, etc. Who is a building block, who is a cheap depth piece, who is a bad fit or has flatlined?

Briere should continue to be patient, there's no rush, so he can wait for the right offer/opportunity to come along and focus on value. He's cleared out most of the players who don't fit or who'll be too old when they're competitive, but a few more remain. He's added a bunch of young talent and will add more, but it'll take a few seasons to know what they have.

They're not that far away from the playoffs, better goaltending, better PP, better depth, maybe the right move or two.
But to be a SC contender, I think you have to be a 100+ point team that gets to at least the 2nd rd every season.
That might be 3 seasons away. But that should be the goal.

[Austinfan]

Giroux might have come back, but it was the right move not to resign him, problem was Fletcher was all over the place, trading G was right, resigning instead of trading Risto and then trading for TDA made no sense then.

Giroux went to Ottawa for his wife. He'll probably finish his career there, then sign for one day and retire as a Flyer.
He'd be worth bringing back if he could still play center, but as a LW will just block a prospect.

The Flyers have a few prospects with real upside in the system:

Bonk - he's the defensive backbone of London, which is trying to win the Memorial Cup again, he's not going to be flashy, but I'll bet he has a 10+ year career as a 22+ minute a night defenseman, similar to Niskanen

Jett - watching him on the Phantoms, he looked like an 18 year old (doesn't turn 19 until the end of August) but gradually improved, has first rate defensive instincts, plus passer, just defers too much to older players but will be a solid two way 2C who lives up to his name.

Barkey - the only question is his size and whether he can hold up in the NHL. Started slow this season due to mono, first 13g 1-11 12, next 37g 24-46 70, so far in the POs, 10g 9-11 20. He's the captain of a London team with Dickinson, Cowan, Bonk and O'Reilly, all 1st rd picks.

Zavragin - 19 year old starter on SKA, which is so choosy they exiled Michov to Sochi rather than play him. Has already started 58 games this season and won't turn 20 until August. His career trajectory so far matches up with goalies like Sorokin and Shesterkin. Has a chance to be special.

Other than that, the only prospect with top 6 upside is probably Grebenkin, big kid who has small player agility and puck handling. Guys like Bump are bottom six to me, Wisdom, Dowart, Powell, Gendron. Berglund is too far away to know, see if he starts in the SHL next season. Same with Ciernak. McDonald, Grans, Samson bottom pair D-men. Gill is also too far away to judge.

[Florida_Sunshine]

Giroux doesn't have much left in the tank. He can come here in a year or two and sign a 1 day contract to retire.

We probably did about as well to be expected by getting Tippett. Didn't we also get a draft pick?

[Austinfan]

Got a 3rd (Barkey) and a 1st in 2024 which we traded for Edmonton's 1st in 2025 since it was #32.

[zambonir]

Tippett has definitely exceeded the expectations people had at the time of the trade. He was the equivalent of a second-first-rounder (he was taken 10th overall) but seemed less valuable than an actual pick at the time - he hadn't produced and might not have even earned the extension the Flyers actually gave him. Whether he in fact has can still be debated but not in terms of the trade.

But the Flyers did have to include Rubstov, a former first-rounder himself, another player and a 5th rounder in the deal too. There's no question they had few options but that's what no-trade clauses do. The only debate at the time was whether Colorado's offer was better, but Giroux preferred to stay East.

AF is certainly right that the Flyers had no idea what they were doing when they traded Giroux and then turned around and went all-in again, instead of that being the start of the rebuild.

[Docs]

But the Flyers did have to include Rubstov, a former first-rounder himself

This was the equivalent of nothing other than a Hail Mary change of scenery option. He was already a bust and only played four games for Florida, was not offered a qualifying offer at the end of that season and has been in Russia ever since

“Everything I’ve turned up has said that the deal started with Colorado’s 2023 first round pick. Among the players rumored to have been traded would have been young defender Justin Barron. Barron, a first rounder in 2020”

[zambonir]

For sure, Tippett was the second-most valuable piece and Rubstov was just a throw-in, but the deal was still not just Giroux for Tippett and first.

[flyers19rw]

Why is it that Ersson has hot streaks of very good play and then slips to being a poor player? Why is it that he can play for Team Sweden and look extremely competent? Perhaps because he is a talented young guy who has been overworked by poor coaches, developed improperly and is on a lousy defensive team. When he came to the Flyers he had the best stats for a Swedish goalie since Lundquist. I'm not ready to kick him to the curb like the Flyers did with Bobrovsky.

[Docs]

the interesting thing for me is that at the time reports indicated that the flyers were more interested in the colorado offer, and if the reports are correct, the panthers deal ended up better because Barron is a twice free agent third defensive pairing for a bad Nashville team.

Colorado shifted gears and dealt Justin Barron to the Montreal Canadiens in exchange for Artturi Lehkonen and a 2024 second-round draft pick on March 21, 2022, which helped them win the cup. I think Giroux would have been better, but Lehkonen had a great playoff run for the avalanche.

[zambonir]

Yeah, poor Claude, Avs won it that year and he'd probably also have a Cup had he re-signed with Florida.

[Austinfan]

Ersson did get overused after Hart was suspended, he was slotted as a backup starting 25-30 games.
Last season he started 47 games, not a huge workload.

Think he's just not a starter right now, maybe down the road.
He was a 5th rd pick, didn't excel in the SHL, injured in 2021-22, was so-so in LHV in 2022-23 (.900 Sv%).
So no reason to project him as a NHL starting goaltender off his history

There are times when he looks like a starting goaltender, other times, he seems to lose focus.
His ceiling is probably a 1B in a tandem.
Just being asked to do too much b/c there are no alternatives.

[zambonir]

If it's an actual tandem it doesn't matter who is 1A or 1B. Of course it's always better to have an elite goalie, but lots of merely above-average guys have managed to get playoff glory.

It might be the single most telling roster move Briere makes this summer. Does he get a veteran back-up/mentor, a tandem option (be he younger or older) or a guy who is morely like to play 60-65%% of the time rather than 50-50.

Ersson's struggles last year were mostly injuries (and yes, the team around him). The Flyers' struggles were more about the goaltending in the other 35 games.

[Docs]

Anyone have an opinion on Maxim Shabanov coming to Philly? Saw this in the rumors

[zambonir]

Are the Flyers a finalist to land Maxim Shabanov - and who is he, anyway? |...