<p data-userway-font-size=”12″ style=”transition: all; font-size: 15px !important;” data-userway-s4-bigger-text-styled=”true”>The Flyers don’t have the cap space for that deal. They do have the space to fill a couple glaring holes, roughly $9M. You can get a couple $4.5M guys for that. $7-8M in dead space goes away in 26 plus the cap increase, they could be bigger game hunters next July 1.
I’m curious as to the long-term plan for your proposed fix.
Are we talking 1 year deals to fix these couple glaring holes? If so, what sort of player do you think you’ll get on a 1 year, $4.5M (or whatever amount you’re comfortable with) deal? Is it a player that actually fixes said glaring hole, or just another place holder?
As for the cap increase, are you hoping that Zegras poops the bed? Because if he plays up to the hopes the Flyers have for him, I can’t imagine he’ll take a deal for less than the $6.5M he’s making this year. Is that a scenario that has been planned for, if the Flyers let him walk should he ask for market value (assuming he’s what they hope he will be), and if so, what’s the plan for a top 6 center now? And this doesn’t even consider Matvei Michkov, who will be eligible for an extension at the end of next season, and will most likely be getting paid as well (guessing in the neighborhood of that “going away dead space,” if not more).
What I’m seeing in your post is more kicking the can down the road instead of having a long-term plan for success. And no, I’m not suggesting they become a playoff team this year (or the year after, for that matter), but if you improve the record slightly, you’re in a worse position in the next draft, and you end up repeating the cycle, just as the Flyers have done for over a decade now. Is repeating the same old mistakes acceptable?
