On the eve of free agency, the Philadelphia Flyers have made their final decisions regarding their restricted free agents, issuing qualifying offers to four players and allowing six players to walk into unrestricted free agency, including Christian Kyrou.
The unsurprising bit of news is that Trevor Zegras, Nikita Grebenkin, Jamie Drysdale, and Hunter McDonald received qualifying offers. All four players are instrumental to the organization, including McDonald, who has been a mainstay for the Lehigh Valley Phantoms over the last three seasons.
Expect contract talks to ramp up for Drysdale, Grebenkin, and Zegras as the Flyers will want to get those settled as soon as possible. DFO’s Anthony Di Marco has intimated a few times this summer that contract talks have stalled between the Flyers and Zegras because his agent is busy with some of his other clients like Dylan Larkin.
The consensus around the league has been to not worry about Zegras and that a deal should come to fruition. The same can be said about Drysdale, as previously mentioned by Andy Strickland just before the draft.
Signing together could also be a play as the duo came to terms on post-ELC contracts with Anaheim just a few days apart before the start of the 2023-24 season.
As for the players that didn’t receive qualifying offers, it’s a list that includes defensemen Kyrou and Artem Guryev, and forwards Karsen Dorwart, Brett Harrison, Tucker Robertson, and Philip Tomasino.
Guryev was acquired from the San Jose Sharks in an early-season trade that also netted the Flyers Carl Grundström, Harrison was acquired previously from the Boston Bruins in a trade involving Massimo Rizzo, Robertson was acquired previously from Seattle in a minor-league trade for J-R Avon, and Tomasino was acquired from Pittsburgh for Egor Zamula.
Kyrou is probably the only surprise from the list considering he tallied 10 goals and 34 points in just 55 games for the Phantoms after being acquired from Dallas for Samu Tuomaala. The 22-year-old was also a right-shot defenseman who many were hoping could make the leap to the NHL thanks to his offensive capabilities.
With the start of free agency scheduled for tomorrow, expect the Flyers to be more active this summer with $33,681,250 in projected cap space available to them. Drysdale, Grebenkin, and Zegras should take off a decent chunk, but the Flyers have been rumoured to have interest in defensemen Darnell Nurse and Zach Werenski while also looking into trades for Rasmus Ristolainen.
As is always the case, take everything with a grain of salt as the Flyers like to work outside of the rumour mill, but have also shown a proclivity for holding onto their assets rather than making a move right away.
It will be interesting to see what changes the Flyers make to their roster that surprisingly made the playoffs, considering how many Eastern Conference rivals have upgraded and improved prior to and during the draft.
The ball is firmly in Daniel Brière’s court.
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