The Philadelphia Flyers have never been a team afraid to make trades. Bobby Clarke alone made over 150 trades as the Flyers' general manager.
We're looking at one particular move that he made, along with one more made by Paul Holmgren, which not only sacrificed young players but ended up creating serious depth problems for the Philadelphia Flyers throughout the 2000s, which was clearly a problem.
Are they not jumping to mind? Are the players not obvious? That's ok; we'll remind you. We're hitting the way back machine and sipping on some hindsight 20/20 to talk about Dennis Seidenberg and Joni Pitkanen.
Looking the Dennis Seidenberg trade more closely
After breaking into the NHL and generally looking like he belonged, Seidenberg was unceremoniously jettisoned to Arizona for the services of Petr Nedved. There was also a pick swap involved, but those players (Joonas Lehtivuori and Tomas Marcinko) were inconsequential.
Nedved was a productive player at the end of his career, and the Flyers were hoping for an offensive boost. They ended up getting 49 games over two seasons and 21 total points. It was the classic Clarke swing and a miss. He brought in a veteran name, and it didn't quite get the Flyers there.
The Flyers had 92 games of Dennis Seidenberg, but he would go on to play another 767 games. While he was never an offensive force, Seidenberg was a stabilizing defenseman who could play 20 minutes a night, block 150 shots, and throw 150 hits. You could use a player like that anywhere from 4 through 6. He would go on to win a Stanley Cup with the Boston Bruins, doing just that.
The Joni Pitkanen trade also hurt the Flyers
Pitkanen played three years with the Flyers and was pretty productive during his time. His 116 points as a defenseman (over 206 games) still rank 26th all-time among Flyers. For reference, Cam York has played 103 more games (309) and is still 13 points behind Pitkanen on the list.
Now, Pitkanen had a lot of ups and downs as a player. He was offensively gifted but took too many penalties. He could block shots, but wasn't the most physical player. Pitkanen had a big engine, though, never averaging less than 22:18 minutes a night, save for his rookie season.
Still, rather than commit to Pitkanen, the Flyers dealt him and Geoff Sanderson for Jason Smith and Joffrey Lupul. Lupul played arguably his most consistent hockey with the Flyers, and Smith was a hard-hitting stay-at-home defender who captained the Flyers for a season. Still, the Flyers only had Smith for a year and Lupul for two. Pitkanen would go on to play parts of 6 more seasons (4 full), racking up another 166 points.
Did the Flyers miss out?
Probably. Let's look at some of the luminaries on defense that the Flyers rolled out instead of these two. Ole-Kristian-Tollefson, Danny Syvret, Ryan Parent, Steve Eminger, Ossi Vaananen, Andrew Alberts, Rory Fitzpatrick, Randy Jones, Sean O'Donnell, Marc-André Bourdon, Andreas Lilia, Kent Huskins, and Bruno Gervais.
It would be very difficult to make an argument that any of them were better players during this stretch than Seidenberg or Pitkanen. Instead, they represent a missed opportunity for the Flyers.
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