Of all the rebuilding talk surrounding the Philadelphia Flyers heading into the 2023 offseason, by far the most intriguing conversation has been the fate of soon-to-be 25-year-old Carter Hart. Hart now has five NHL seasons and 201 games under his belt and is entering the last year of his current contract at a $3.9 million cap hit. He’ll be a restricted free agent next summer. It has led some to speculate that the Flyers could seek to deal him this summer to make the most out of their rebuilding efforts with the king’s ransom they’d hope to land in return.
But is dealing their franchise goaltender really the best move for the Flyers?
Pros
Trade value
If we’re just talking ranking trade value of the players on the roster without taking consequences into consideration, Hart is probably their most valuable trade chip on the roster. Now that Danny Briere proved he can craft a big trade after moving Ivan Provorov, it’s more likely to believe he can scope out proper value if they do in fact deal their star netminder.
Avoid his next contract
It’s been a long time since the Flyers have had to worry about giving any real thought to the cost of their goaltenders, but that’s about to change during the summer of 2024. Hart will hit restricted free agent status and will be in for quite a raise from his current $3.9 million cap hit. For a team that all of a sudden cares about their cap space, committing big money to their goaltender, no matter how good, may not be in the cards.
He’s good not great…
Despite his best efforts, Hart’s career numbers are rather underwhelming. He’s sitting at a 2.96 goals against average and .906 save percentage with 84 wins in 201 NHL games played. Those are relatively average numbers by today’s standard. He was 32nd in GAA league-wide in 2022-23 and 27th in save percentage. “Mid” as the kids say.
Cons
…But we’ve seen him be great
Hart’s pedestrian numbers are directly linked to how terrible the team has been during his time in Philly versus indicating his personal play has been sub-standard. His .926 save percentage through 14 playoff games back in 2020 was goaltending excellence from Hart and he’s shown flashes of replicating that over the years, it just hasn’t come consistently on a bottom-ten team. Do you give up on him because the rest of the team is bad, or do they improve the rest of the team and have a top goaltender to build off of?
Who replaces him?
What makes many comfortable with moving Hart in the first place is the presence of 23-year-old Sam Ersson, who played his first full season in North America in 2022-23 to much fanfare at both the NHL and AHL level. Though he struggled down the stretch for the Phantoms and recorded just a .899 save percentage in 12 appearances with the Flyers. He may turn out to be a very good goaltender in time, but if for whatever reason he doesn’t pan out, the organization may be in trouble.
Can they get proper value in a trade?
25-year-old franchise goaltenders don’t get traded everyday. It’s even more rare to find a goaltender trade where the team got a significant return for their goalie. The most recent example of a top goaltender getting moved was probably Roberto Luongo back in 2006. He would’ve been 27 at the time of the deal and the Panthers got back Alex Alud, Bryan Allen and Todd Bertuzzi. That trade was 17 years ago and there isn’t a prolific example since. Maybe not having a reference to work from is a good thing, but maybe it just makes it easier for the Flyers to get taken to the woodshed in a potential deal.
Conclusion
Sometimes there are bad ideas that are visible a mile away, and trading Carter Hart is a very obvious mistake.
After the blockbuster Provorov trade, it feels like anything could happen in Flyerland this summer. The Hart rumors picked up some steam shortly after the Provorov news broke and it had June 23, 2011 PTSD written all over it. Though it hasn’t happened yet, Hart could very well become a causality of the rebuild, but it still doesn’t mean it’s a good idea in the short or long term.
The theory behind moving Hart always started with “well Sam Ersson’s here” and while it’s a good thing that the Flyers do have a young rising goalie waiting in the wings, it’s just far too early to make that call. At best, Ersson makes the main roster out of camp and challenges Hart all season long for the starting gig. If that’s the case, then maybe revisit this topic next summer before Hart’s extension. Making that call now and Ersson ends up not being what they expected and the whole franchise is screwed.
There’s absolutely a price tag to sell Hart, but it’s just not likely to be within the realm of reality when it comes to scoping out an actual return. Roberto Luongo was the last number one goalie to get dealt, which was way back in 2006, and Cory Schneider, who was an immaculate backup at the time of his trade in 2013 was probably the most recent example of a high-profile goalie trade when the Canucks got the ninth overall pick in return which they used on Bo Horvat.
Where there’s smoke there’s fire, and an uptick in rumors could very well indicate the Flyers are about to part ways with Hart as the entry draft is less than a month away. Trading Hart is easily the biggest thing this franchise could do this summer, and Briere seems unafraid to walk into his office, unzip his pants, whip out his beachball-sized nuts and remind everyone this is his team now. All we can hope is that he can put together a deal that isn’t an obvious loss for the Flyers, because Hart’s absence is going to be felt for a long time to come.
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
photo credit: nhl.com
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