Rasmus Ristolainen, originally drafted eighth overall by the Buffalo Sabres in the 2013 NHL Draft, played eight seasons for the Sabres before being moved to the Philadelphia Flyers in a trade that most fans in Philadelphia are still upset about.
GM Chuck Fletcher paid a very hefty price to acquire the Finnish blue-liner: Robert Hagg, the 14th overall pick in 2021, as well as a second-round draft pick in the upcoming 2023 NHL Entry Draft. Fletcher then inked Ristolainen to a five-year deal worth $25.1m that officially begins this year and comes out to about $5.1 million per year in average salary. Despite the large price tag attached to the 27-year-old, his first season on Broad Street was not a memorable one, finishing with 16 total points and a -9 in plus/minus in 66 games played on the year.
Throughout his eight seasons in Buffalo, all of which were played during one of the most lackluster and chaotic eras of the franchise’s history, Ristolainen recorded 245 points in 542 games as a Sabres defenseman. Despite having no real star talent around him besides a young Jack Eichel, including no real defensive mentor for Ristolainen to develop and mature into a fine two-way defenseman at the NHL level, he still managed to record over 30 points in five of his eight seasons with the Sabres.
Developing a young defenseman into a top pairing guy without having a mentor to help him get there is truly a tough thing to do in the NHL, but it’s almost impossible when you have six different coaches with one team since being drafted. Add those six coaches to the two Flyers coaching systems he’s had to learn last year and Tortorella’s upcoming system, and Ristolainen has had at least nine different head coaches on two teams since being drafted just nine years ago.
No defenseman becomes a top pairing star player under those circumstances, no matter how high Ristolainen’s projected ceiling was before entering the NHL. This is a very similar issue to the one the Flyers have been having with Ivan Provorov and Travis Sanheim. Both of them are young two-way defensemen with high ceilings, but have never had a true veteran to show them the ins-and-outs of being “the guy” on a consistently mediocre-talented team in Philadelphia.
At 6’4” 221 lbs, Rasmus Ristolainen is built like a tank, but contains such smooth skating abilities that, when combined with his soft touch on the puck, still allows him to have a chance at reaching his ceiling under the right coaching system. John Tortorella and his system could truly be the answer to fans’ prayers to seeing Provorov, Sanheim, and Ristolainen all reach a new level of playing high-caliber hockey.
Rasmus Ristolainen is under contract with the Flyers until the summer of 2027, so there will be plenty of time to see how his career shakes up–or doesn’t–in Philadelphia. At 27, he still has plenty of quality years left in his career, but only time will tell if he’s able grow more as a defenseman in the most talented hockey league in the world.