The dust from day one of NHL free agency has settled and the Flyers made their moves and got out of dodge prety quickly. They made five signings only July 1, after the Trevor Zegras trade a few weeks back.
So did the Flyers have a good free agency and 2025 offseason? Let’s ask ourselves some questions.
Did they fill holes?
Yes.
The signed a center, a goalie, a right handed defenseman and a depth forward and center. They weren’t exactly home runs, but they needed help at C, G and RHD and added bodies at those positions.
Did the Flyers royally screw themselves over down the road with more miserable contracts?
No!
If there was any win to take away from free agency, it’s that the Flyers did not ink someone to a long-term deal.
The Flyers love long term contracts. They hand them out to their own roster players like candy on halloween. So the fact they were able to contain themselves and not dish out one, let alone half a dozen, to the random dudes they signed is a win by itself.
Did they make tangible progress?
Not Really.
Dan Vladar is insanely disappointing. The bar for improvement between the pipes was so painfully low and they found arguably the worst option in a shallow FA pool. The guy with a career 3.00 goals against average, .895 save percentage and only 105 games played over the course of five years is just not what the Flyers needed. He’s not a starter and his numbers are near identical to both Ersson and Fedotov.
Christian Dvorak is fine. The pair of Dvorak and Zegras is significantly better than Poehling and Dorwart they replaced. It’s not a major leap forward, but it is improvement.
The depth signings are whatever. Noah Juulsen is probably their short-term replacement for Ristolainen so they didn’t have to rely on Oliver Bonk or Helge Grans for an undetermined amount of time. But it’s likely they all end up in the AHL or benched in the NHL for most of the season.
This was probably more likely to be a bunch of deck chair shuffling than it was tangible progress, but the upgrades at center have the chance to blossom into a decent one-two punch given how strong their wing group is.
Did they build towards the future?
Kinda.
They’re in a bit of a pickle with this one. They’ve got so many prospects making the jump to the pro level in 2025-26 that the future is kind of being built in front of them. They didn’t really help the cause along by adding a corner stone player or trading for a young up-and-comer, but given where they’re at, there’s a reason why they didn’t make commitments anywhere yet.
Zegras could be an answer for the foreseeable future, but that’s not a guarantee yet as they have not re-signed him.
Will this summer help them be competitive in 2025?
TBD.
This one is largely going to come down to whether or not Zegras is a top center. Unless Vladar posts some kind of miracle season it’s very unlikely these signings make any real impact.
So did the Flyers have a good free agency?
The answer is kinda. It’s not a no, but it certainly isn’t a yes either.
The reality is this is the kind of offseason they should’ve had last summer. Baby steps in the right direction building towards a theoretical goal. The half-assed attempt this summer is just a little disheartening.
They didn’t commit themselves to any random dudes for a long period of time, which is a small victory… but that win comes at the cost of not adding anybody of substance either.
Again, there are a lot of moving pieces when it comes to the internal prospects making the jump to the professional level, and the Flyers’ big-brain plan focusing in on the .003% chance Connor McDavid hits free agency in 2026. There could be a method to their madness for keeping this summer light on the improvement front, but that is still very much not a guarantee.
They’re also waiting on Russian star Maxim Shabanov to make his decision. The Flyers are still supposedly in the mix, but the player has not picked a team as of this writing. Considering Tyson Foerster could miss significant time with an elbow infection, a last-minute add of Shabanov could be a big help. It could definitely put the offseason in an overall better light if he were to sign and succeed on the ice.
This summer largely keeps pace with with the rest of Briere’s 2025. Moves that are fine if compared to the insanely low bar that the Flyers have become, but rather bland when taking the bigger picture into consideration. There was nothing that was egregiously bad, which is a good thing, but with the exception of banking on Zegras’ career renaissance, they didn’t really help themselves either.
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
photo credit: nhl.com
brotherlypuck.com 