The Philadelphia Flyers were pushed out of the playoffs early by the Pittsburgh Penguins, but still have a good enough core to believe that they can compete next season. There’s no tear down or rebuild happening, but GM Ron Hextall also isn’t looking to land any of the big free agents on the market. Speaking today to media including Sam Carchidi of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Hextall indicated that he would only be going after unrestricted free agents on short-term deals.
We’re certainly not going to reach out on a seven-year deal on a good player, I can assure you that.
Those comments would seem to take Philadelphia out of the running for both John Tavares and John Carlson (and maybe others), while also directly stating that he hasn’t spoken to the Ilya Kovalchuk camp and doesn’t expect to in the future. Instead, they may look at smaller free agent deals to support their current group. Tavares and Carlson are sure bets for seven-year deals if they hit the market, and could even earn eight-year contracts from their current teams over the next few weeks. Both will have plenty of suitors, and a bidding war that the Flyers clearly don’t want to get involved in.
As for Kovalchuk, he seems to also have healthy interest from around the league after visits to Los Angeles, San Jose, Detroit and several other clubs. The Flyers have their own scoring winger to worry about, as Wayne Simmonds is eligible for an extension on July 1st. The 29-year old has been one of the league’s best bargains for several seasons, and is in line for a huge raise on his next contract.
This is while they’ll be a 500 team forever
They already have two underperforming 8 million dollar plus contracts. They don’t need another which might (if it’s Tavares) buy them at the most a first round win.
You mean the guys who finished 1st & 4th in assists last year and 2nd & T-13th in points?
Yeah, those guys suck!
Don’t get caught upon stats dude. Watch the games where 93 in particular played with his head up his ass. All I said was that they under-performed for their contract values. Try trading either without retaining salary and see how many takers you find.
The cost will probably be to high,but Provorov-Carlson would be a nice top pair.
Not just them 2 as a top pair either,
Prov-Carlson-Ghost-Myers-Sanheim could be a nice top 5,with l/r balance.He would also give us a veteran presence on D.That would make buying out MacDonald next year an option,without leaving our top 4 with a lack of experience.
If you watched any Flyers games you’d know Giroux outperformed his contract this year and to say he underperformed is ignorance