On the surface, the Flyers don’t appear to have a lot of cap space – less than $900K, in fact, according to CapFriendly – but that number is a bit misleading. With defenseman Ryan Ellis already ruled out for the year, they can place his $6.25MM AAV on LTIR, opening up considerably more spending room.
To that end, GM Daniel Briere made an appearance on TSN 1200 (audio link) where he indicated that he has told teams that he is open to taking on a contract but as is always the case, helping a team out of a cap bind comes at a cost:
I’ve talked to many teams, and I’ve let them know there’s a possibility for us to help them if they’re able to help us on the back end with some younger guys.
Ottawa is a team that is certainly needing to open up some cap space to sign Shane Pinto and there’s no doubt the two sides have spoken although clearly, there hasn’t been a match in a trade just yet. Mathieu Joseph and Erik Brannstrom are the two speculated players that they’re open to moving to accomplish that; of the two, Brannstrom might fit in a bit better as he’s young enough to potentially be part of Philadelphia’s future plans on the back end. That said, it’s worth noting that moving Brannstrom and his $2MM price tag alone isn’t enough to get Pinto signed.
With more than half the league using LTIR or being within $1MM of the Upper Limit of the salary cap, the Sens certainly aren’t the only team that will be looking to open up some extra flexibility so Briere is in the driver’s seat with this one. Accordingly, Philadelphia appears to be well-positioned to leverage that cap room into adding another young asset to aid in their rebuild.