The Philadelphia Flyers are in the no man’s land part of the offseason. While they do have the NHL Draft Lottery upcoming on May 7, it is unlikely that anything newsworthy will happen for the Orange and Black for quite some time aside from that.
Based on where the Flyers stand, however, their 2024 offseason might be eventful. They could make some significant progress in their rebuild.
Dissecting Briere’s End-of-Season Presser
During his end-of-season press conference, general manager (GM) Danny Briere did his best not to reveal too much about his team. While he did state that players like Marc Staal and Denis Gurianov would not be returning, he doesn’t plan on trading young pieces for a veteran, and he likely won’t be making a big free-agent splash, that doesn’t tell a whole lot about his plans. All of these things were, frankly, pretty obvious.
Briere never definitively stated whether or not he’d be trading veteran pieces such as Travis Konecny, Travis Sanheim, Scott Laughton, or Rasmus Ristolainen. He also never talked about trading for a young impact player like he did with Jamie Drysdale. The Flyers’ direction in 2024-25 — whether they will push to make the postseason or not — is sort of a mystery. Briere had an optimistic approach to some young players such as Cam York, Tyson Foerster, and Bobby Brink taking a step up and making a playoff push possible, but that was about all.
Head coach John Tortorella stated that the team is very far away from being a Stanley Cup contender in his end-of-season press conference, so that is something Briere is aware of, too. The GM said he expected young players to get even better and the team should improve in that way, but pretty much left it at that. He said nothing about being a buyer or a seller entering the offseason.
At the very least, it is clear that Briere will be busy this offseason. There’s a lot of work to do, and he’s not of the mindset that his team is a piece away from doing something special. Perhaps this presser was the calm before the storm.
Why Ivan Fedotov?
In what was likely a prerequisite to him coming over to North America late in the season for the Flyers, 27-year-old goaltender Ivan Fedotov signed a two-year, $6.55 million contract with the Orange and Black to serve as the backup behind Sam Ersson on April 23. The netminder spent 133 games in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL), going through some off-ice trouble to make the move possible.
Related: Flyers’ Ivan Fedotov Has a Lot to Prove in 2024-25
At his peak, Fedotov was one of the better goaltenders in the KHL. In 2021-22, he had a .919 save percentage (SV%) in the regular season which was 28th out of 73 netminders, but he took his play to the next level in the postseason. He went 16-6-0 and had a .937 SV% in the process, winning a KHL championship.
Right after that, though, things took a bad turn for his odds to make the transition to the NHL. He had to miss his entire 2022-23 season due to required military service. Perhaps as a result, in 2023-24, his .914 SV% was pretty mediocre, ranking just 41st out of 75 goaltenders in the KHL. His contract was terminated and he came to Philadelphia shortly thereafter.
Though it was a small sample size, Fedotov looked out of place in the NHL. He appeared in just three contests, putting up a .811 SV% which was the second-worst number recorded for any goalie in 2023-24.
While Fedotov is likely to see some improvement, bringing him to North America to be the backup for the Flyers and paying him so much to be so was an interesting decision. He had his peak over two calendar years ago, and even that doesn’t come close to rivaling many of the KHL netminders who became elite NHL starters. If he reaches his potential, he could be a decent NHL starter, but likely nothing more than that.
Briere could have signed a free-agent goaltender like Alex Nedeljkovic who could make a similar amount of money despite showing both a low-end starter’s upside in his recent past but also being a high-quality backup for the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2023-24. Instead, he went with the much riskier option in Fedotov.
Ersson was at his peak when he was a low-volume starter and really started to struggle once that workload was intensified. The Flyers could have had a safer goalie duo if they explored the free-agent market, but now they have someone who might not even be worthy of playing in the NHL as their go-to backup.
So, what exactly was the motivation for Briere? Overpaying for a potential liability in goal shows that the Flyers are willing to take a lot of risks. Instead of laying low and taking the safe road, the GM is making sacrifices. It could be a taste of what is to come. Making a splash for an early first-round pick in the 2024 NHL draft shouldn’t be out of the equation for a GM who operates like this, and neither should acquiring a young top-six center. Briere has guts, and it means that the possibilities in the offseason are endless.
Flyers Lucked Out in Missing the Playoffs
Though it would have been nice to see the Flyers make the playoffs, they now have a favorable scenario of having 85.7 percent odds to select with the 12th overall pick in the draft. Ordinarily, that wouldn’t be very good. In the 2024 class, though, it is actually really great.
If the Flyers stay at the 12th pick, they should have one or two of Cole Eiserman, Berkly Catton, Konsta Helenius, Tij Iginla, Anton Silayev, or Carter Yakemchuk on the board. The first three appear to have first-line potential in the NHL, while the other three aren’t too far behind in their projections. These are some legitimate impact players that the Flyers could have their hands on, and it’s only possible because they missed the postseason by losing nine of their last 11 contests.
Instead of being a potential first-round sweep like the eighth-seeded Washington Capitals were, the Flyers are sitting cozy and awaiting a very exciting draft with many great options to choose from. At the end of the day, their collapse in their last few games of the regular season should help them.
Speculation is all that can really be done with the Flyers at this stage. They aren’t giving up too many of their secrets, and that’s okay. Another wild offseason just like Philadelphia had in 2023 might be coming up in a few weeks.