Philadelphia Flyers fans have been calling for a proper rebuild for years. New general manager Danny Brière came in and started to fix a lot of the problems that Chuck Fletcher (and even Ron Hextall) had left the Flyers with.
The Flyers had a lot of underperforming players on contracts that they needed to get rid of? Out go Ivan Provorov, Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee. The Flyers had a lot of underperforming players that no longer fit their timeline due to age? Out go Scott Laughton, Kevin Hayes, and Cam Atkinson. The Flyers had little to no assets left after Fletcher drained the draft picks? In come three first round picks, five second round picks, and two third round picks.
The Flyers had no legitimate prospects left after Fletcher drained and farm system? In comes… well, you see, THAT is where the Flyers’ problem occurs.
Over the past three to four years of the Danny BriÈRA (just thought of that one right now, super proud of myself), he has done a very good job turning the garbage that was here into meaningful draft picks that could contribute a lot to the future of the Flyers. I mean, the Flyers went into the 2025 draft having seven picks in the first two rounds! For a team that was depleted of real assets, having three first round picks and four second round picks in one draft is incredible. So what’s the problem, then? Usually teams that have that many picks and opportunities have the fanbase feeling optimistic that ONE of the pieces will hit.
Now I know the Flyers have drafted both Matvei Michkov and Porter Martone in two of the drafts Brière has been GM for, but when you look at the current roster construction of the Flyers, the last thing they need are wingers. Don’t get me wrong, I am PUMPED to have both Michkov and Martone as two of the core players here for the next generation of Flyers, but other than those two guys, the Flyers don’t have any young blue-chip prospects in positions of need right now. Trevor Zegras is still young, but it’s looking like he’s a wing-center hybrid like Claude Giroux was later in his career. Jamie Drysdale is still young and developing, but I would not consider him a “prospect” at this point in his career.
And then comes the most important position for a contending hockey team: the center. The Flyers’ current NHL roster has a center group of… well… Christian Dvorak, Noah Cates, Sean Couturier, and Carl Grundström while Rodrigo Ābols is on IR. That is BAD.
The farm system isn’t much better. Right now if you were to ask a Flyers fan who the best center prospect in the system is, most of them would give you an answer but not be thrilled about it. What’s even crazier is that the answer could be three different people right now. Jack Berglund had an incredible 2025 World Juniors for Sweden and looks to be molding into a fine second round find, Jett Luchanko has an unbelievable skating ability and defensive hockey IQ, and Jack Nesbitt… well he’s tall and is good defensively. But the problem with all these centers has been the problem with the Flyers for years: a lack of offensive skill and upside.
This has been a problem for a while now, as this lack of offensive skill has been a trait the Flyers have drafted since before Brière was in charge of the GM position. How is it that a new GM who had very loose ties to the previous regime is making the exact same mistakes that put them in this position. There’s a new President of Hockey Operations in Keith Jones, so it can’t be that. It’s not even the CEO of Comcast Spectacor that was involved, as Dave Scott did nothing and Dan Hilferty is brand new. There has to be SOMETHING that carried over.
Oh. Brent Flahr has been the Flyers’ assistant general manager since December 12, 2018. Oh would you look at that, Flahr is in charge of the Flyers’ drafting and prospect development. Great.
The Flyers have used eight first round picks on players since Flahr has been here. Let’s see how each of them are doing
2019: Cam York
The infamous Cam York over Cole Caufield selection. While York has been a serviceable top four defenseman in the NHL, Cole Caufield is a superstar goal scorer. Caufield is on pace for 47 goals and 34 assists this year. The last Flyers player to score 40 or more goals in a season was Jeff Carter… he was traded 14 years ago.
2020: Tyson Foerster
Okay, in a vacuum, this is a home run pick. Foerster has been knocking on the door to break out the past two years. Unfortunately, he cannot stay healthy. There is also a problem with the Flyers having too many wingers as stated before. Yes, when they took Foerster they were not as deep on the wing, but over-saturating the team with wingers in the following years really muddied this pick.
2021: NO PICK
Chuck Fletcher traded this pick for Rasmus Ristolainen. I will give him no credit, he tripped and fell into Ristolainen being saved by Brad Shaw.
2022: Cutter Gauthier
Moving on.
2023: Matvei Michkov, Oliver Bonk
Michkov’s KHL situation made this pick a no-brainer at the time, especially with where the Flyers were at the time. No credit there. Oliver Bonk was a safe choice, but not a flashy one. You already got Michkov, so why not take a swing on a player like Gabe Perreault or Easton Cowan, because a prospect with high offensive upside will always be valued more than a low ceiling defenseman in trade discussions at a later date. We still haven’t seen Bonk at the NHL level yet, but he is now in his third year since this draft. He has not shown anything special besides scoring power play goals from the bumper on the London Knights.
2024: Jett Luchanko
Man, for a team that had been looking for a first pair defenseman for years, the Flyers did a great job of actively avoiding taking Zeev Buium during the draft. The Flyers actually traded OUT of the spot they were in so Minnesota could draft Buium. The Flyers then do what they do best, go galaxy-brain and pretend they are smarter than everyone else by taking Jett Luchanko over centers like Konsta Helenius and Michael Hage. Buium was also the headliner in the package back to the Canucks for Quinn Hughes by the way. And how is Luchanko doing? Well after making the team out of camp in his first year, he got sent back to juniors and well… since then he has been not great. He was traded from his juniors team this year to maybe help his offensive development since Guelph was a black hole. How did that work you might ask? He is now playing right wing… which is the position the Flyers absolutely need the least help in. Sick.
2025: Porter Martone, Jack Nesbitt
Just like with Michkov, Porter Martone only made it to pick number six because there was an absolutely insane run on centers to start the 2025 draft. Martone is probably the second or third-best player in that class, so taking him there is fine. Trading two first round picks for Jack Nesbitt was insane. Nesbitt cannot skate, and he is a major project who has probably second line upside at the most. When you’re scrambling for players at a specific position, especially a center, taking a long-shot prospect after trading two first round picks to take him is asinine. Hopefully Nesbitt develops and makes me eat my words, because Flahr had to have seen SOMETHING in him for that decision to have been made.
The drafting in the first round has been less than ideal. Outside of tripping and falling into Michkov and Martone (neither who can be the #1 guy on a Cup team, in my opinion), the Flyers’ drafting has been suboptimal. A lot of middle or bottom six forwards and a couple second pair defensemen. The man in charge of that operation on paper is Brière, but Flahr has his fingerprints all over these prospects. On top of that, Flahr is in charge of the prospects and their development. I can name two non-first round prospects from the past seven drafts that have made a legitimate impact at the NHL level: Bobby Brink and Denver Barkey. MAYBE you can throw Emil Andrae in there, but in the famous words of John Tortorella talking about Morgan Frost, “He’s up and down like a toilet seat.”
The Flyers’ rebuild has been talked about for three years now from the front office themselves, but no matter what the Flyers end up doing the rebuild is doomed to fail as long as Brent Flahr is in charge of the draft and the development of prospects.
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