Philadelphia Flyers Make Another Round Of Roster Cuts

The Philadelphia Flyers have made their third round of roster cuts.

A day following their 3-1 loss to the Boston Bruins, the Philadelphia Flyers have made more cuts to their roster. The team announced that they have waived forward Kyle Criscuolo and defensemen Nate Prosser, Tyler Wotherspoon, TJ Brennan, and Reece Wilcox for the purpose of sending them to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms while assigning forward Isaac Ratcliffe, Pascal Laberge, Maksim Sushko, Matthew Strome, Greg Carey, David Kase, Cal O’Reilly, Gerry Fitzgerald, defensemen David Drake, Josh Couturier, Rob Michel, and goaltenders Felix Sandstrom and Kirill Ustimenko.   Head Coach Alain Vigneault said that he wanted to accelerate the process and felt no longer inclined to give players on the outer bubble additional time.

Vigneault also stated that there’s a lot there he still needs to teach and that he wanted to get practices down to one, single group. Fans should get ready to see more players who will be on the roster on opening night during the final four preseason games. It was clear during the loss against the Boston Bruins that the players were still trying to get acclimated to what Vigneault wants them to do on the ice and I don’t blame the Flyers coach for wanting them to receive more game-action to become more adjusted to his system.

As far as the cuts go, none of them should come as much of a surprise. While Ratcliffe certainly has the potential to become a serviceable NHL player in the future, it was clear in the first exhibition game that he was a step behind guys like Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee. He should shine with the Phantoms this upcoming year and continue to develop as an overall player. I also liked what I saw out of Sushko, but again, he wasn’t going to beat out the Frost’s and Farabee’s of the world. Sandstrom and Ustimenko never really got their chance in the preseason, but should obtain plenty of time in the AHL, ECHL, or even both.

These round of cuts also show that Vigneault and General Manager Chuck Fletcher think Frost, Farabee, German Rubtsov, Nicolas Aube-Kubel, and Mikhail Vorobyev have what it takes to be on the roster on October 4th. All have had solid performances throughout these first three contests but will obviously need to continue to do so to earn a spot in the Bottom-6.

The Flyers roster now stands at 36 players. Their next game is Saturday against the New York Rangers.