Philadelphia Flyers Could Take a Step Back This Year
Philadelphia Flyers GM Ron Hextall is sticking to his plan for the team, but some teams may leapfrog them this season as the Flyers build slow
The Philadelphia Flyers created a lot of excitement in the city of Philadelphia last year with their improbable run to the playoffs. After a slow start, the Flyers went 16-6-3 in their final 25 games to qualify for the NHL playoffs. This would cause most fans to look at the team and think about what the Flyers need to do in order to take that next step towards being a Stanley Cup contender.
The Flyers did take some steps to improve the team for this up coming year. They signed Dale Weise who will give them more size, speed and goal scoring from their bottom six forwards. They signed Boyd Gordon to help with defensive zone draws and penalty killing. This move should give Claude Giroux some relief from having to take so many defensive zone draws and should allow him to start more of his shifts in the offensive zone.
Although these moves will make the team better, they aren’t the kind of moves that will vault the Flyers from being on the playoff bubble in to a Stanley Cup contender. The Flyers will still be a team that will be fighting for one of the final playoff spots at the end of the regular season. And there is no guarantee that they will succeed at making it in to one of those final few playoff spots. Even with their 16-6-3 run to end the season last year, the Flyers barely squeaked in to the playoffs. They clinched a playoff birth on the second to last day of the regular season by beating a Pittsburgh Penguin team that was resting all of their star players because their playoff positioning had already been decided.
The Flyers also benefited from the Boston Bruins going 1-7-1 down the stretch thus allowing the Flyers to, let’s face it, back in to the playoffs. The Flyers needed to have a lot of things break their way in order to get in and fortunately for them they did. There is no guarantee this will happen again next year.
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There are other factors to take in to consideration too when looking at the Flyers playoff chances for the upcoming season. A lot of the teams that finished behind the Flyers in the standings last year made some big improvements this past off season that could vault them ahead of the Flyers for the final playoff spot.
We all know about the job Flyers GM Ron Hextall has done at re stocking the Flyers farm system. Many publications rank the Flyers minor league system in their Top 5. Even with all of the talent that the Flyers are stockpiling in their system though, all of their prospects are anywhere from one to three years away from playing in the NHL.
So when you look at the Flyers, the long term prognosis is extremely bright. But, when it comes to the immediate future, it is possible the Flyers could take a step back before taking that first significant step forward. And this isn’t a bad thing. Right now the main focus of the Philadelphia Flyers should be on finding ways to rid themselves of veteran players with big salaries like Mark Streit and Matt Read while developing their young prospects like Ivan Provorov, Travis Sanheim, and Travis Konecny. If the Flyers miss the playoffs next year but all or most of their young prospects take a step closer towards playing in the NHL, the season will not have been a waste. Next is a list of teams who I think have a chance to surpass the Flyers in the standings.
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The Buffalo Sabres
Even though the Sabres finished 17 points behind the Flyers , they are a possible candidate to surpass the Flyers in the standings and wrestle that last playoff spot away from them. The Sabres are further along in their development than the Flyers are when it comes to having their young prospects ready for the NHL The Sabers minor league system has been ranked at the very top of the NHL for the last three years now and a lot of their young prospects are either ready to play in the NHL now or have been flipped for young, established NHL players like Evander Kane and Zach Bogosian.
The Sabres have also benefited from picking in the top 5 of the NHL draft and therefore have been able to draft players who are able to make an immediate impact like Sam Reinhart and Jack Eichel. The Sabres also made a big splash in free agency to improve their anemic offense by signing Kyle Okposo. They also bolstered their defense corps by acquiring Dmitry Kulikov from the Florida Panthers. Add all of this to a team that also has young players like Ryan O’Reilly and Rasmus Ristolainen and the Sabres could be a force to be reckoned with next year.
The Carolina Hurricanes
The Hurricanes finished 10 points behind the Flyers in the standings last year. Like the Sabres, the Hurricanes have some young players like Elias Lindholm and Noah Hanifin who are already on their NHL roster and who only figure to get better with each passing year. Even though the Hurricanes finished 10 points out of a playoff spot, they weren’t eliminated from the playoffs until there were only four games left in the season.
They also traded for Teuvo Teravainen, another young, skilled player who was able to make an impact playing second and third line minutes on a stacked Chicago Blackhawks team. Teravainen figures to get much more playing time for Carolina and therefore he will be able to make a much greater impact with them. His style of play fits right in with Carolina who is a fast, skilled team. If young players like Ryan Murphy and Justin Faulk also continue to improve, the Hurricanes are another team who could challenge the Flyers for that last playoff spot.
The Montreal Canadiens
.After setting the league on fire with their 9-0-0 start, the Canadiens season quickly went south after the injury to All World goaltender Carey Price. Goaltending wasn’t the only reason why the Canadiens season went in to the toilet. The replacements for Price were adequate. But, when you go from perhaps the best goaltender in the world to an NHL back up, there is going to be a drop off in play.
Having a top flight goaltender can have a huge psychological impact on a team too. When a team can play more relaxed because they know they have someone in net who can erase most of their mistakes, they play with a lot more confidence and aren’t afraid to take chances. When a team doesn’t have complete faith in their netminder, they tend to be a little more tentative. So Price’s loss impacted the Canadians in more ways than one.
Goaltending wasn’t the Canadiens only problem though. The team gained a reputation for being soft and for folding when facing adversity. Canadiens GM Marc Bergevin addressed this problem by trading flashy defensman PK Subban to the Nashville Predators for the more rugged Shea Weber. The Predators might make out on the deal in the long run since Subban is only 27 where as Weber is 30 but, for the here and now and when it comes to stacking up the Flyers to the other teams in the Eastern Conference for next year, the deal could benefit Montreal.
The Canadiens addressed two of their biggest needs in acquiring Weber. Lack of physicality and lack of leadership. With Weber being a big physical defenseman who was the Predators captain last year, he should help in both of these areas. So the combination of having a healthy Carey Price and the acquisition of Shea Weber could catapult the Canadiens ahead of the Flyers in the playoff race.
Do I think it is a forgone conclusion that the Flyers will miss the playoffs next year? Absolutely not. The Flyers will contend for a playoff spot and have as good a shot as anyone in the bottom half of the Eastern Conference to make the playoffs. At the same time though, just because the Flyers made the playoffs last year, I don’t think it’s a lead pipe cinch the Flyers will return again next year. There are teams behind them that are making rapid improvements and who could overtake the Flyers for that last playoff spot next year. Even though it may feel like it at the time, it won’t be the end of the world.
Even though the teams mentioned above have made improvements and could surpass the Flyers next year, it doesn’t mean they are in better shape than the Flyers are long term and it doesn’t mean they are closer than the Flyers are to winning a Stanley Cup. A lot of the moves these teams made only make them better in the short term. Weber for Subban being one example of that. The Flyers are also limited in what they can do because of their salary cap situation and because of the fact that they are still saddled with some bad contracts. So there isn’t a lot they could have done to improve their team for this upcoming season. A team like the Sabers on the other hand has the salary cap room to go out and sign a Kyle Okposso.
This will all start to change soon though. The Philadelphia Flyers are free of Mark Streit’s contract after this year and Matt Read’s the following year. They are loaded with high end talent in their system. When the Flyers start to add some of the high end talent like Ivan Provorov, Travis Sanheim and Travis Konecny to an already good young nucleus of Claude Giroux, Jake Voracek, Wayne Simmonds, Braydon Schenn, Sean Couturier and Shayne Gostisbehere, they will not only jump back over the Buffalo Sabres, Carolina Hurricanes and Montreal Canadians of the world, they will be ready to take that leap forward and start competing with the Tampa Bay Lightings, Washington Capitals, and Pittsburgh Penguins of the conference.It’s not just about next year Flyers fans. It’s about the big picture. Slow and steady wins the race.