As we await the start of this upcoming season for the Philadelphia Flyers, it’s a good time to get to know the team better and see where they stand heading into the fall. With that, it’s time to answer a few of your best questions. We’ll look at some expectations for Cam York in 2024-25, who the Flyers’ team MVP will be, who the most underrated prospect is in the organization, and where I project the team to be in the standings.
Based off of What We Know Now, What Kind of Season Do You Think We Can Expect from Cam York? — @bluebeetle94
While York took on a top-pairing role for the duration of his 2023-24 season—the first time in his career that he got that kind of ice time—that doesn’t mean it was his best showing. For the 23-year-old, I believe there is more to be seen.
It might seem obvious that York’s play last season was his absolute peak due to his usage, but it objectively wasn’t. In reality, he was at his best in 2022-23—the analytics back it up. Looking back at some clips from that season, he had all the confidence in the world and was really involved off the rush and inside the offensive zone. He played very aggressively but was also responsible enough at 22 years of age to treat the defensive side of his game with care—his numbers at both ends of the ice were sensational.
Versus last season? He had the same defensive numbers, but the offense completely tanked. Based on the eye test, he just didn’t have those same looks—he was more reserved. We saw some flashes of brilliance once in a while, but the same exciting player that was present in 2022-23 took on more minutes and, thus, put defense before anything else.
Those flashes remind us that the elite two-way version of York is still very much present. In 2024-25, I think we see more of what made him so great two seasons ago. With Matvei Michkov in the lineup now, the Flyers should start to lean on their offense a bit more to win games. Before, they were a low-event team whose primary objective was to prevent scoring chances. Now, I believe York will get to show what kind of player he actually is.
Related: Flyers’ Projections: Cam York’s Offensive Upside
It’s hard to put an exact number on points—especially since offensive impact isn’t solely defined by that metric—but I’d wager that he can score between 40-45 versus the 30 he had in 2023-24. This is assuming he stays healthy and perhaps gets some looks on the power play, but I wouldn’t put it past him. York oozes with potential that watchers didn’t get to witness very often last season—the hope is that this can be realized.
Who Do You Think Will Be the Team’s MVP? — @MATVEIAURA
There are quite a few answers we can have here, but Michkov is the single most important player on the Flyers’ roster this upcoming season. Not having a talent like him put a cap on any hopes the Orange and Black might have had of making noise in the playoffs in 2023-24 had they made it. Now, they have a superstar prospect and he’ll be ready to make an impact.
Anyone who has watched Michkov knows what he’s all about. He’s uber-talented and processes the game in such a way that is beyond the normal hockey mind. He is a machine designed to create offense and score goals, and that’s exactly what he did with regularity in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) last season.
What makes Michkov so valuable for the Flyers in 2024-25 is the fact that they don’t have a player anything like him. Travis Konecny would probably be the safe answer for the Flyers’ team MVP, but they have two players—Owen Tippett and Joel Farabee—who do their damage in a similar manner. The style and potential of Michkov makes him the ultimate wildcard for the Flyers this season.
Projecting Michkov’s numbers is somewhat trivial as it’s really anyone’s guess, but we can expect him to have a high-end offensive impact at both even strength and the power play. Overall, around 30 goals and 30 assists might even be pushing it if he’s healthy, but it’s also not an unreasonable expectation. Even if he doesn’t score a ton of points, he can still be helpful to the offense just by being present and forcing a lot of attention from opponents.
Who’s the Flyers’ Most Underrated Prospect at the Moment? — @DankCrayon
This question is a pretty fun one. I have raved about him in the past, but I still don’t think enough people give 19-year-old right-handed defenseman Carter Sotheran the credit he deserves.
Sotheran was put in both the best and the worst situation simultaneously with a stacked Portland Winterhawks team in 2023-24. For Western Hockey League (WHL) standards, his offensive totals—51 points in 74 games across the regular season and the playoffs—were decent but not overly impressive. But what that fails to consider is the fact that fellow 19-year-old right-handed defenseman Luca Cagnoni often played ahead of him in the lineup. If anything, Sotheran’s scoring was great for the situation he was in.
Cagnoni signed his entry-level contract in the offseason, so he might go to the American Hockey League (AHL) through the duration of 2024-25. It’s not a guarantee by any means, but he was so incredible for Portland that it would seem like a waste of a season for him to play in juniors again—he is far too good for the WHL. If he is no longer with the Winterhawks, we might see Sotheran’s offensive game shine.
Getting to his actual play, Sotheran is a very responsible player who was exceptional in the neutral and defensive zones. He gave up basically no scoring chances, and that’s because he defended so well—his absurd plus-66 rating was evidence of that. Whether it was an odd-man rush or a one-on-one battle, he almost always came out on top. His passing game is solid and he’s a reliable zone-entry defender, especially for one who is 6-foot-3.
However, one area where I think he can improve is inside the offensive zone and with the puck. There’s some talent here, but he didn’t show it frequently enough to suggest it could be useful in the NHL. His offensive game is pretty raw, but there’s potential here that I like.
Again, Cagnoni’s departure can allow us to see the best of Sotheran. Before the offensive numbers potentially explode, keep a close eye out for him in 2024-25. I personally see him as a second-pairing NHL defenseman if he hits his ceiling—this season will be a big one in proving that.
Flyers’ Standings Prediction? — @Bennett_CK
I have gone on record a few times stating that I think the Flyers will make the playoffs. It’s important to note that injuries could derail this vision, but I’ll get into that later.
I see the Flyers sitting at 97 points this season and fourth in the Metropolitan Division for the last wildcard spot in the Eastern Conference. This isn’t what I believe to be their ceiling, either—there is more potential with this group than most people will give them.
My confidence in the Flyers mostly has to do with their construction. In 2023-24, they were nearly a playoff team but very flawed roster-wise. Their fourth line was one of the worst in the NHL through most of the season, the power play was actually the worst in the NHL, only one team had a worse team save percentage (SV%) than they did, and only one team had a worse team shooting percentage (SH%) than they did, the center position was a mess in the second half of the season, and Jamie Drysdale played his entire campaign with a sports hernia.
I don’t expect all of these issues to just vanish, but I do expect some situations to improve. The shutdown line of Noah Cates, Ryan Poehling, and Garnet Hathaway was formed pretty late in the season and not meant to be much, but it gave the Flyers new life—they were fantastic. Head coach John Tortorella didn’t have a line that could handle this kind of shutdown role for most of last season, but now he does.
Adding Michkov and subtracting Cam Atkinson is also a huge win for the Flyers, as the latter just didn’t have it anymore. Michkov gives them an exciting offensive piece who can drive up their team SH%, power play scoring rate, and elevate the players around him in theory. His talent could be raw at the NHL level, but that’s the entire wildcard aspect—he could be better or worse than we expect.
The center depth is the exact same as it was a year ago, but each player has a specific role that they need to fill. Sean Couturier blew that up entirely when he suffered a sports hernia—he was still in the lineup, but he went from playing like a great first-line center (arguably as good as his 2017-18 form) to only being useful in the bottom six. This forced Morgan Frost, a struggling Scott Laughton, and Poehling up the lineup—it completely devastated the team and its construction.
Getting Couturier back at presumably full health eliminates the center fiasco and puts everyone back where they belong. There is always the risk of injury, which makes the playoff projection somewhat bold, but a healthy Flyers team is playoff-caliber. If the centers specifically can stay healthy for most of the season and perhaps Frost and especially Laughton can improve, the group down the middle can work.
Drysdale being healthy this season is self-explanatory, as he projects to take on a second-pairing role. We didn’t get to see the real version of him because of how limited he was physically—it’s almost like he is debuting as a Flyer in 2024-25. He’s a similar wildcard to Michkov particularly due to the talent aspect, so we’ll just have to wait and see how things play out.
Finally, the goaltending is something we can expect to get better. I’ve discussed it ad nauseam at this point, but it can’t be said enough—Sam Ersson was fantastic when he was the Flyers’ low-end starter. Starting 32 of Philadelphia’s last 38 games, that’s when his SV% heavily regressed to the .890 he finished with. Tortorella didn’t have a backup goaltender he could rely on, so he was giving Ersson no days off. The addition of Ivan Fedotov can hopefully end that madness. With a respectable workload for both of them, there’s potential here. At the very least, regression seems doubtful.
The playoff prediction here doesn’t assume everything goes right, but it does assume that the Orange and Black take some steps. The Flyers’ 2024-25 roster is the deepest that they’ve had aside from their 2019-20 campaign in a pretty long time—there’s depth, a talented star with Michkov, and no big weaknesses aside from maybe between the pipes and the center depth if there are long-term injuries. Other teams will pose a threat, but there should be optimism regarding the team.
All of your questions are appreciated at this time of year! If you want to help out in a future mailbag, the comment section below is a great place to contribute.