Fresh off of Niskanen’s retirement, the Flyers wasted no time in bringing Justin Braun back.
After the shock of Matt Niskanen’s decision to retire, the Flyers had to make another move on their backend. That opened the door back up for Justin Braun to re-sign in Philadelphia.
Signed not long after the news first came out, the contract will be for two years. He will have a cap hit of $1.8M for each season. Unsurprisingly, that is a pay cut $3.8M he was making on his previous deal. So he drops exactly $2M to stay with the Flyers.
While Braun won’t replace Niskanen, he was another valuable piece of the newly improved penalty kill. He will likely remain on the third pairing with Hagg as the Flyers will have to find a replacement for their top pairing.
Braun is also a long-time veteran in the NHL. Drafted in 2007 by the Sharks, he had spent his entire career with San Jose up until this past season. He came to the Flyers in a trade for two draft picks.
With the Sharks, Braun was known more as a defensive defenseman. He could put up points when needed with his best output coming during the 2017-18 season. That year Braun posted a career-high 28 assists and 33 points overall.
With the Flyers this season, Braun had three goals and 19 points. 14 of those came within the last 29 games of the season. His three goals also came during a span of five games.
So adding all of that together, he has appeared in 669 games between the Sharks and Flyers. His career numbers thus far are 27 goals and 173 points.
There are still more questions that will need to be addressed on the Flyers backend. But the team knew they couldn’t lose both Niskanen and Braun this offseason. We’ll see if this keep the door open on Shayne Gostisbehere as well.