The New Unending Flyers thread

[zambonir]

Look at you, arguing for free agents and trades!

Certainly, it's just that the Flyers haven't shown any particular facility to hit big in the back end of the first round, or later rounds. Or picking high. Not never, obviously, and development (or giving up on guys to win now if you want to take the even longer view) also a factor. Perhaps Luchanko will be the first of many good ones, but it still wouldn't hurt to draft higher this year.

[Austinfan]

Sanheim and Konecky would both go top ten in a redraft.

One of the keys to finding talent later in the draft is a little patience, often the highest picks are the more NHL ready picks, but players as good or better are available later, though talent thins out.

Good reason to accumulate 1st and 2nd rd picks and be patient with their development.
You're going to miss more, but in the end, it's the number of "hits" that counts.

[LegoDoom]

I still don't know why TK slipped, but why did the flyers pass on Cole Caufield? You don't need to have high draft picks, but you need to hit on the lower first rounders if that is your strategy.

[zambonir]

Sanheim and Konecky would both go top ten in a redraft.

Haha sure but those were both 10 years ago. You might even argue that was Holmgren's regime for the most part. Hextall was hired a month before the Sanheim pick and he kept Chris Pryor around. That's who they have not been able to replace, even if his time with Hextall was not as strong as his overall career.

[Florida_Sunshine]

Are you sure about that? Maybe I am losing my mind but wasn't Briere the GM then?

[Docs]

Tortorella was named the head coach of the Philadelphia Flyers on June 17, 2022 - Briere was made GM in March 2023.

[zambonir]

Heh, technically Briere was made GM in May of 2023, along with Jones being hired as President. He was interim before that. But the bigger change was probably Hilferty taking over in February of 2023. Torts was hired by the Dave Scott/Chuck Fletcher regime, which still included Holmgren.

If those guys had still been running the 2023 draft they might have traded the pick for a veteran center or terrible defenseman

Of course Briere did already work for the team in 2022.

[zambonir]

Q&A: Flyers president Keith Jones talks Matvei Michkov, prospects, the goalie...

It does kind of sound like the same old Mr. Snider Flyers here. But that approach (versus full-on tanking and having a roster full of demoralized vets and young players who don't know what it's like to win) is defensible. The test will still be what they actually do if last year's deadline situation is the same: hold, sell or buy.

I think the players believe that they’re better than their record [12-10-3], and we’re always going to encourage that. We’ll never be a team that’s looking to drop. We’re going to be a team that tries to win every game. And I believe that’s the way that you have to be, and I think that’s going to help our younger players moving forward.

[Austinfan]

The fact they haven't traded for a veteran center tells you winning isn't the priority Jones pretends it is.

As far as Caufield, they traded down to #14, took York who has been solid on the 1st pair with Sanheim, and then used that extra pick to trade up for Brink. Caufield is a one trick pony with a very good trick (goal scoring). York is becoming an all around D-man who eats minutes. The jury is still out on Brink who has improved this year but still has work to do to be a top 6 forward.

Tortortella was brought in to provide structure and discipline as if that could make up for a lack of talent.
He took one look at this team and then challenged the party line that they were a competitive team, and I think that accelerated the replacement of CF and Scott. Briere was put in place by Comcast (Camillo) to learn for a year before being handed the reins.

Whether the current strategy will work remains to be seen. But at worst, they'll have a young team with a lot of tradeable assets. At best, they'll find a couple more Sanheims and TKs out of all their 1st and 2nd rd picks. Andrae, for example, shows a lot of promise as a puck moving D-man. If you can't have 3 or 4 superstars, then build a deep team and play a fast paced game (see Carolina) and wear people down.

The wildcard is Zavragin, at 19 he's having an outstanding season in the KHL, check back in 2027-28 when his contract expires and he probably comes over. If he becomes an elite goaltender, that could make a good team great.

To me the goal is to be a 100+ point team every season for an extended stretch, then hope you have a hot goalie in the playoffs. Even TB, as talented as they were, only won when Vasilevsky was at the top of his game.

[zambonir]

For sure. Though, they have also been protected from temptation by the payroll. They couldn't even go get a back-up goalie last deadline (though fortunately they also thought that was less important than taking on salary from Colorado). There was no real option to sign FAs this year. They could still take back NHL players this deadline when they unload others, but they surely wouldn't be rentals.

Briere is Camilo's Rob Thomson. He was really supposed to have Jones' job, not Fletcher's. And then she couldn't even keep hers once Scott left.

[Docs]

Heh, technically Briere was made GM in May of 2023, along with Jones being hired as President.

Not sure why you felt the need to technically me there - i provided the information relevant to the question whether briere was the GM when torts was hired. Interim in March, with the interim label removed in May doesn’t change the point.

[zambonir]

Wasn't trying to correct you, was more replying (especially with the "heh") to FS and noting that Briere's authority to hire a coach came even later.

I actually thought my OP was worded kind of funny and wasn't sure if FS thought I was claiming Briere didn't draft Michkov (rather than that he didn't hire Torts).

In any case, I think most of us can agree that the Flyers were not rebuilding when they hired Torts but they were by the time they drafted Michkov (and, for that matter, by March of 2023).

And I don't think the timeline has really changed - just a few things around the edges. They would have liked to have a winning team and solid core by the time Michkov arrived, with a few changes/additions in tandem with with that arrival, or maybe even a year ahead. Now they will have to consider adding people who can grow with him starting next year. But either way they were probably not going to use all the 2025 draft assets as straight-up picks, and were going to be active in remaking the roster and having some money to spend in 2025 and 2026

[bkeich]

Flyers now technically in the last playoff spot (although 1 team below them has 1 less point with 2 games in hand).

I understand that the goal is not playoffs at any cost, but all of these young players surely can benefit from going through the playoff process, even briefly. Just being in a playoff race would be good, but actually succeeding in one would be big.

The NHL is the one sports league we’re #1 loses to #8 every once in awhile instead of as a miracle.

[flyers19rw]

It's all a nice ride right now. In some cases they are catching good teams at their weak moments. In others they are hustling and beating their opponents. However when the league starts to tighten down as the season progresses, the Flyers weakness at center ice is going to be a problem for them. The Blues started to play into that by taking away the plays going up the boards. Other teams will see that and adjust their play accordingly. No team is going to win unless they can play in the center of the rink.
As a group Couturier, Frost, Cates and Poehling just aren't good enough at center. It may be painful but some players are going to have to be moved out to fill that void. On defense that may mean Risto or York; on the wing it could be Farabee, Foerster or Brink; probably Frost as well. Unfortunately for DB, there is a dearth of good centers in the league right now. Teams that have them don't want to give them away.

[Austinfan]

I expect them to draft a couple centers (and a couple D-men) this summer.
They're deep at wing and goalie.

Laughton and Risto will probably be traded at the TDL or before the draft, Fedotov, if he keeps improving, may be moved before the draft to make room (with Bjarnason in LHV next season, they only need 2 goalies).

I can see a "compression" trade where they package Frost, a prospect and a 1st or 2nd rd pick for a center, but they'd be looking for a 25 or under player with top six potential - not a lot of them available.

I think they want to be PO competitive the next couple years for development, but don't expect to be SC contenders for a few more years until they build up critical mass.

[VoteForKalas]

Many of our F are underperforming so far and are all negative in +/-

Frost - 10 pts, -8
Tippett - 12 pts, -10
Foerster - 8 pts, -3
Farabee - 8 pts, -8
Laughton - 9 pts, -15
Brink - 12 pts, -8

Just not good enough at all. Thankfully, the defense and goaltending has helped us win games, but until we have an offense with any consistency, it will be a big struggle.

And, once again, our PP stinks on ice - ranked 26th in the league. We've added and changed talent on the PP units over the years and nothing has worked. At some point, the coaching has to be held accountable and new ideas & staff brought in to fix it.

[Austinfan]

Like RBIs, +/- is passe, for one thing, it's very goalie dependent.

Hockey now has numerous advanced stats, here's a free site

https://www.naturalstattrick.com/playerteams.php?season=20172018&stype=2&sit=5v5&score=all&stdoi=oi&rate=n&team=PHI&pos=S&loc=B&toi=0&gpfilt=none&fd=&td=&tgp=82&lines=single

Flyers had a terrible start, but the last 12 games are playing similar to last season by metrics (record is actually above what it should be).
Basically a 90-95 point team with average goaltending, ended up with 82 last year due to goalie implosion.

[zambonir]

Be that as it may all of the players VFK listed have below average CF%s, as does Michkov, even if it's also true a lot of that dates back to the poor start.

But it's also no secret the Flyers' best offensive forwards can't play defense, and without good center play it's hard to balance that out.

Talent's surely a factor on the PP as well but yeah, if this isn't Torts' last season, hard to think they won't have to make a change below him, and should be trying some adjustments to the approach now.

[Austinfan]

Thye're still in rebuilding mode.
Torts has settled on his lines and first two D-pairs (at least for now, come the TDL???).
So now it's time to see which young players take a step up.

Cates is a good example, improved his skating from below to above average, has sterling defensive credentials, but Torts wants him to be more aggressive on offense. We'll see if he can make that transition.

[VoteForKalas]

Whatever metric you choose, they are struggling offensively and these F are underperformed their talent.

Until the offense takes a step forward, thus team will not progress.

The defense and goalkeeping is showing promise, but we will not win the games we need with this offense. Sure, the lack at the C spot is real in 5 v 5 play, but we have plenty of talent for a good PP.