From “Reach” First Round Pick to Stand Out Defensemen, Flyers Sanheim Has Gotten Better Every Year
In June of 2014, the Flyers were in the throws of the Nicklas Grossmann era and were looking desperately for a way out. As per usual under the Holmgren regime, the Flyers found themselves against the cap with little room for improvement via trade. But Ron Hextall had just been named general manager and was about to change the direction of the franchise. Travis Sanheim was the first pick in that transformation.
Thought to be a reach by the Flyers who used the 17th pick overall to select him, Sanheim was thought to be a mixed bag. A good skater when he is up to speed, bad skater as he was getting there. He was said to have an accurate shot with a slow and sloppy release. A long defender that had problems when things got physical. An overdeveloped penchant for jumping into the play offensively, which translated into bad positional defense and containment. For every positive attribute there was a corresponding negative. Hextall and his staff were not dissuaded by the detractors and took the player they wanted, the one who they thought would be the best.
By his draft+1 season Sanheim’s star was on the rise. He had started to temper his offensive aggression, picking his spots a little better, charging ahead less frequently and getting much better results. His shot improved, his defense got better and suddenly many people were saying he was a high ceiling, top pair defensemen. I was not one of those people, I saw an above average height player with above average skating ability who liked the offensive zone a bit too much for a defender.
I did not get a great look at Sanheim until the 2017-2018 season, his rookie season. He played 49 games for the team and I did not like what I saw. In my view on offense he was a bigger, slightly smarter version of Steve Duchesne, on defense he was a liability. Bad decisions and pushed around by smaller players. He would make the line up, but really was not someone who could help the team or his teammates.
The following summer Hextall would assess Sanheim, heaping praise on the youngster but then end with “He needs to get stronger”. It was a mantra Hextall would continually repeat about Sanheim. I wondered what he meant every time he said it. What did this GM-speak actually mean? It turns out Hextall was being literal, he thought that Sanheim just needed more physical strength and he would be fine. I had my doubts.