The 2023-24 NHL season is finally on the horizon and as training camps start to pop up, the nucleus of the upcoming rosters begin to take shape. At least, that’s what’s supposed to be happening. The Ottawa Senators still have two restricted free agents to sign and not a ton of money to do it with. It has led to some interesing rumors that they may be forced to deal forward Shane Pinto if a deal can’t be reached soon.
Pinto, who turned 23 in November, was the 32nd overall pick in the 2019 entry draft and played his first full NHL season in 2022-23 scoring 20 goals and 35 points in 82 games along with a -21 rating, third worst on the Senators. Does it make sense for the Flyers to throw their hat in the ring to try and acquire his rights? Well, let’s weigh some pros and cons of the deal.
Pros
potential upside
Pinto played his first full NHL season in 2022-23 and scored 20 goals. Not a bad mark to hit for a rookie. There’s not much in the rest of his stat line that sticks out as an overwhelming positive, but for a team like the Flyers that haven’t had a pure goalscorer in decades, adding someone like Pinto to compliment the abundance of playmakers could be a symbiotic relationship that works out in everyone’s favor.
He’s a center
Easily the most intriguing part about Pinto is that he’s a center, and for a team like the Flyers who, after all these years, still haven’t attempted to address their shallowness at the position. He lined up anywhere from second to fourth line center for the Senators last season, and could easily be the best offensive-minded center on the Flyers’ roster, which could open him up for a permanent top-six spot with plenty of powerplay time.
It’s a rebuild, after all
After a baffling summer when the Flyers loaded up on aging veterans and didn’t do much to highlight youth, acquiring Pinto as a last-minute save the gives them one young guy who has upside and will *probably* be featured highly during the season. It’s the kind of thing that a team in this situation should do. They need to be more calculated, however, as last season they went in on Kieffer Bellows and a few weeks later Eeli Tolvanen was waived by the Predators. Do they go all in on Pinto, or hope a better options awaits down the road?
Cons
The asking price
While there haven’t been any official rumors to swirl yet, but Anthony SanFilippo theorized the Senators could be looking for a cap dump, mainly Matthieu Joseph, who has three years left at a 2.95 million aav. The Flyers have some cap to play with once Ellis goes on LTIR, but not as much as you’t think. The biggest question is who goes back in return? Is the math going to work out well? The Flyers can’t continue to ravage their own cap situation for the near future after the Kevin Hayes and Tony DeAngelo debacle this summer. If they’re eating cap, they need to be smart about it.
Blocking their own prospects
Who needs your own prospects when you can just go get other ones? As noted in the last entry, if Morgan Frost remains, they pretty much cut his ice time in half, and it keeps Elliot Desnoyers in the AHL for a while longer. At least Pinto is only 22 with upside… so it’s not like it’s a 36-year-old coming in and taking away minutes from a 23-year-old they just extended… but maybe consider being totally sure as to what you’re dealing with from your in-house options before adding more irons to the fire.
Where does he fit?
Just because he’s a center doesn’t mean he is guaranteed a spot on the main roster. It’s almost a guarantee Sean Couturier and Noah Cates take priority down the middle, and if Frost is still lingering around, tagging in an out with Pinto hurts both of their ceilings. Too many cooks in the kitchen and not enough ice time to go around.
Conclusion
The Flyers are in a rebuild and taking a crapshoot on someone like Pinto should absolutely be in their wheelhouse, but in a deal that could consist of multiple pieces coming back to the Flyers, it continues to congest an already insanely murky roster.
The biggest question is what a trade actually looks like. Is it a one-for-one player swap for someone like Morgan Frost? Is it just a draft pick? Or is it a bigger multi-player trade where the Flyers are eating salary? As noted, the Flyers do at least have a little bit of financial breathing room so they can craft a multitude of deals to accommodate the Senators, but taking on salary (and still having to re-sign Pinto himself) could get this team in a bit of trouble and take away future opportunities to add assets.
One thing they need to consider is the John Tortorella factor. Is Pinto a “Torts guy?” Are they going to craft an extravagant trade only for Pinto to immediately enter the dog house and have his potential cut out from under him? The return of Sean Couturier really limits the chances for another center to rise up if their games doesn’t meet the standards of the head coach, so is it even worth it if he just gets stopped and started like Frost did last season?
If the deal is right, then Shane Pinto could be a Flyer before opening night. It’s a fun thought to have a shiny new toy that may actually be good at hockey (what a novel concept!) and if Danny Briere can make it happen in the least painful way possible, it’d be an added bonus. If it’s done poorly, however, picking up the tab on even more salary and adding yet another body to an already overcrowded system could just make things even more uncertain for the future. They just need to ask themselves- is this the guy to take a gamble on?
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
photo credit: TSN.ca
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