It feels like the first time in a long, long time that the Flyers don’t have salary cap problems. Because… well.. it is. But that feel good momentum may not last beyond the 2024 offseason. They’ve got some decisions looming that will impact the financial situation pretty dramatically, so let’s explore what lies ahead for the Flyers this offseason.
Buyouts
We’ve looked at the individual 2024 buyout candidates before, but did not delve into what exactly it means collectively for the team’s salary cap.
The leading candidates for buyout are Ryan Johansen, whom the Flyers acquired at the 2024 trade deadline in order to get a first round pick from Colorado in the Sean Walker trade, but he’s apparently enjoys flipping off old ladies and telling kids the tooth fairy isn’t real, which totally cramps the vibes the Flyers and their culture based attitude are looking for. Then there’s Cal Petersen, who is among the worst goaltenders in professional hockey over the last few seasons, and Cam Atkinson, who is the third oldest living person on planet Earth and ironically hasn’t scored a goal since the Pleistocene.
Ryan Johansen ($1.33 mil) Cal Petersen ($1 mil) and Cam Atkinson ($2.35) all have favorable buyout cap hits individually, but added with Tony DeAnglelo ($1.66) and Kevin Hayes ($3.57) who are still receiving a paycheck from the Flyers, that’s nearly 10 million dollars ($9,929,763 to be exact) in dead cap in 2024-25.
And with all three of Johansen ($1.3 mil), Petersen ($2 mil) and Atkinson ($1.75) plus Hayes ($3.57) still on the books in 2025-26, that’s still $8.62 million in lingering dead cap two seasons from now.
There’s good reason to buy out all three and none are necessarily considered frivolous. It costs the Flyers $3.8 million to bury Petersen in the AHL, but with Ivan Fedotov and Alexei Kolosov now on American soil there’s no real reason to keep him, and that cap is better used elsewhere.
If the Flyers felt as though Ryan Johansen didn’t even deserve a chance with the main roster despite their lackluster center depth and overall weak offense this season, it’s highly unlikely they change their tune next year. And given Nashville is partially responsible for paying his buyout, it’s not that bad a deal for the Flyers.
And Atkinson is just washed. With guys like Bobby Brink, Olle Lycksell, Samu Tuomaala and others still losing NHL ice time because of him, he’s got to be dealt with. The original hope was that he’d play well enough during his return from neck surgery that the Flyers could explore a trade, but that ship has more than likely sailed.
Retained Salary
There’s also the option of retaining salary, a.k.a the Flyers keeping part of the player’s salary to trade them away. It’s a possible avenue they could explore with any of the aforementioned players in the buyout entry, but the catch is they’d likely carry a higher dead cap during the 2024-25 season, but be free in 2025-26.
Then there’s Rasmus Ristolainen, who was rumored to be on the block leading up to the trade deadline, but an injury kept him in Philly.
The problem with a Ristolainen trade is that the rumors indicated that his $5.1 million cap hit for three more seasons isn’t a palatable number for potential suitors and money would more than likely need to be retained for a trade to occur.
Half of Ristolainen’s deal (the most the Flyers could retain) would be $2.55 million on the books until 2027. No matter what the specific dollar amount would be, it’d be until the conclusion of the 2026-27 season.
Even though the salary cap is expected to rise multiple millions of dollars for the first time since the pandemic, most teams are so stuck that impractical spending is still improbable. It means that the Flyers would have to tack on a notable asset or two for a team to take on a player like Cam Atkinson even at 50% retention ($2.94 million).
Contract Extensions
Not only are the Flyers in a sticky situation with potential buyouts, but they’ve got some in-house extensions to deal with, too. Travis Konecny, Cam York and Tyson Foerster all need now contracts during the 2025 offseason, but can all sign extensions starting July 2024.
All three are in different phases of their careers- Konecny looking for a monster deal that will carry him for the rest of his days, York getting ready to cash in on his first big time contract after signing a two-year bridge deal in 2023, and Foerster who is coming off his entry-level contract as one of the rising stars of the offense.
And while we’re a bit too early to know what exactly each player will demand, they’re all making the case to cash in on serious paydays.
It wouldn’t be impossible for Konecny to sniff the $10 million aav plateau (even though it’d be ill-advised). York could be paid in the $8 million range, the going rate for a top young defenseman. And Foerster may just get a bridge deal for now, but it may clock in at $3 million or potentially more.
Either way you slice it, it’s in the neighborhood of $15-20 million. And that isn’t even factoring in other players in need of deals in 2025 like Noah Cates and Morgan Frost and any outside additions they would opt to make.
Conclusion
Danny Briere has walked a fine line between leading the Flyers through a rebuild while trying to compete for a playoff spot. Throw in the emphasis on culture and their history of moving players (Hayes, Provorov) that don’t align with their scheme, they’re slowly working themselves back into a very interesting cap web.
And all this doesn’t account for any major additions too. It may be slim odds, but if they give, say, Sam Reinhart $11 million a year in free agency (yes, it’s beyond doubtful) that complicates things even further.
Or, they could do… nothing. They could run it back with the roster primarily in its entirety, and considering that 19 of 23 players already have contract for the 2024-25 season, that seems like a decent possibility. Just suffer through Atkinson’s presence, Johanson remains “injured,” Petersen gets buried in the AHL and Ristolainen just returns to the lineup when healthy and reassess next summer.
It guarantees that forward on-ice momentum and progress will be slim in 2024-25, but since they overachieved this season, they could probably get away with a minimalistic summer without too much blowback. But if the team vastly underperforms next season they’ll have some questions to answer, as both previous general managers refused to make changes after good seasons in 2017-18 and 2019-20 and it bit them hard.
And yeah, the salary cap is expected to rise by multiple millions for the first time since the pandemic, which does help offset their costs a bit. The 2024-25 projected cap is $87.7 million from it’s current $83.5 million, and a three to five million increase a year should be the norm, barring another global catastrophe that keeps fans out of the building. But “the cap is going up” isn’t great justification for questionable decision making. It’s just not enough of a gain in the short-term to truly counterbalance the current financials after years of a flat cap. It’ll be three or four seasons before the newly distributed wealth of cap inflation makes a difference for most teams after being pinned down for too long.
Hopefully Briere has a strategy here, because it’s easy to make a big misstep with this financial situation and hamstring themselves a few years down the line. They need to manage all of their in-house moves and still attempt to make progress next season without tying their hands too badly because they’re still a long way from winning a Cup. Can the front office figure it out this time? Let’s hope so, because if he can’t the flashbacks of his former boss will be too great to ignore.
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
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