It’s no secret the Arizona Coyotes are entering a rebuild and almost everyone on the roster is for sale. Rumors broke last week that soon-to-be 24-year-old left shot defenseman Jakub Chychrun, who was seemingly the one untouchable on the Coyotes roster, may have found himself on the trade block with the rest of the team. Now, being Flyers fans, we want to throw out hats in any trade rumor that has ever come up. So would the Flyers acquiring Chychrun from Arizona make sense for the club?
Pros
Improvement over Sanheim
There’s a good chance that any trade package for Chychrun would have to include Travis Sanheim, even if for no other reason than to make the cap work for the Flyers. Chychrun has three years left on his deal at a respectable $4.6 million cap hit while Sanheim has one year left at $4.67 million. Sanheim has been on the rise lately in Philadelphia, but his game is still filled with faults, and at 26 years old, three years older than Chychrun, the chances that he develops much further than he has already shown is unlikely.
Takes heat off of Provorov
The main benefit to adding a budding star left-handed defenseman would be the ability to take some of the weight of “number one defenseman” status off of Ivan Provorov. With Chychrun on the team, they’d have more flexibility in how they deploy Provorov, who is seemingly struggling to hold on to the team’s top defenseman role. Theoretically, someone like Chychrun can eat the minutes of a top guy and Provorov can pick up whatever Chychrun can’t. Just imagine a one-two punch of Jakub Chychrun and Ivan Provorov coming at you on defense.
Cons
A LHD is low on the priority list
Out of everything that is currently on the Flyers’ wish list, a left handed defenseman may be dead last. With Ivan Provorov and Travis Sanheim on the main roster with Cam York and Egor Zamula marinating in Lehigh Valley there is no shortage of talent on the left side. Even though Chcychrun may individually be an improvement over all of them, sometimes putting all your eggs in one basket my not be the best solution.
The asking price
If you’ve scrolled through Flyers Twitter last week, you’d see packages such as “Sanheim, Konency and a first” suggested for Chychrun which is just ridiculous. First of all, all the rumors coming out of Arizona sound like the Coyotes are asking for an obscenely high return, moreover, they’re the Coyotes, they’re not looking to add your 25-year-old scrap, they want your picks and prospects. Joel Farabee, Cam York, Wade Allison, Egor Zamula, first round picks during the very deep drafts during the next two seasons, things like that. Now, it’s very rare that massively lopsided trades happen in the NHL these days, so if a deal does happen it’ll more than likely be a little more down to earth than the Coyotes would like, but it probably won’t be an easy package to assemble.
Is any serious package they put together worth it?
Chychrun would make an NHL impact right now, but would you be willing to trade the young players either on the roster or in the system that are currently responsible for the small amount of glimmering hope the Flyers have? It’s not like there’s an abundance of young players left in the system to trade away willy nilly. There’s only a handful of players that the Flyers could put together to entice the Coyotes, and if Philly can match the asking price of any combination of the assets listed above, does Chychrun bring more value than, say, losing Joel Farabee and Cam York?
Conclusion
Jakub Chychrun is a very good player and would probably jump into the number one defenseman role on the Flyers. He’d be welcomed with open arms, but is it worth it? Not only are the Flyers loaded on the left side on defense, there are some pretty glaring holes elsewhere in the lineup that are going to require an abundance of riches from the asset pool to fix. Does Farabee, York and a first round pick make sense for a LHD when what the team really needs is a massive upgrade at center?
If Chychrun was a righty and could be paired with Ivan Provorov to form a top pair for the next decade, this may be a different story. Even if the Flyers are willing to talk to the Coyotes and offer what they can, there’s a good chance many teams will be involved for a cheap, borderline elite 23-year-old elite defenseman, so if a team like the Hurricanes feels like Chychrun is the missing link for a Cup run and offer something crazy like a combination of Seth Jarvis/Jack Drury/Ryan Suzuki could the Flyers even match a package like that?
It’s best to not get your hopes up for this one. There are simply bigger fish to fry in Flyerland these days. Spending assets on an already deep position is a luxury the Flyers just can’t afford right now.
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
photo credit: NESN.com
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