The NHL trade deadline is quickly approaching, and for the Flyers, this could be a big one when it comes to the job security of the front office and the direction of the franchise as a whole. Even though the playoffs are a long shot in Philadelphia, which would extend their postseason absence to a franchise-worst six years, Danny Briere should be getting a head start on making big moves.
26-year-old Robert Thomas, currently playing with the St. Louis Blues, is the biggest center available via trade, and thus, should be a prime target for the Flyers. But will Philly pull the trigger on the guy?
The whole reason why Thomas is in the Flyers’ crosshairs in the first place is because he’s a center. One of the very few available players in 2026 that can not only play the position, but do it at a very high level. He’s broken the 80-point plateau in two consecutive seasons and is over a point-per-game in three of the last five seasons, falling just shy of that pace in 2022-23 and is not likely to achieve it this season.
It probably won’t be a cheap acquisition. Simple economics tells us that scarcity directly relates to the price of an asset. Not only are the Blues looking to get the biggest return possible for one of their best players, but given how many teams need a center, it’s going to jack the price up further.
The Flyers don’t have the best history when it comes to pursuing St. Louis Blues players. Alex Pietrangelo rejected the idea of even giving the Flyers the time of day before he joined Vegas, and Torey Krug made a very public scene when he refused to waive his no-trade clause a few summers ago.
Obviously the Blues aren’t going to let their star player go cheap, and the last decade of history shows the Flyers do not make big trades for main roster help. So what are the odds that things change this time? Well, they’ve entered put up or shut up territory now.
Acquiring Robert Thomas is one of those times when the lack of logic seeping out of the Flyers organization really gets put on display. Do they want to win with this current core, who are all similar ages to Thomas and desperately need a higher-end center to help out? Or are they rebuilding and want to skew younger, despite all the recently handed out long-term contracts to players who hover around 30?
In a perfect world, it’s true that Thomas probably isn’t the guy the organization should be draining their asset pool on. But they sure don’t live in a perfect world. If they want to give the current core a fighting chance to ever make the playoffs again, let alone go further, then they need to spare no expense to acquire him because he’s the best option on the market.
Thomas, who turns 27 in July, is younger than Travis Konecny, Sean Couturier, Owen Tippett, Christian Dvorak, Noah Cates, Travis Sanheim, and Nick Seeler- everyone currently possessing a long-term contract with the exception of Cam York.
He’s got five years left on his contract at an $8.1 million cap hit, which would be the second most expensive deal on the Flyers’ book behind only Travis Konecny, but it would expire at the same time or before pretty much everyone listed above.
Basically, he fits in with the current core they’re attempting to build around… however misguided building around that core is in the first place.
There are actually quite a few examples of the Briere-led Flyers drifting into Ron Hextall territory lately (most notably with the way the negative views of the head coach are dragging down the approval rating of the front office as a whole) but the idea that they have a core of players that they refuse to actually build around in the name of some bastardized version of a “rebuild” is also starting to feel very familiar.
They had the opportunity to sell Dvorak for a king’s ransom at the deadline and instead chose to re-sign him. Same goes for Travis Konecny, who should’ve been dealt away before he re-signed during the 2024 offseason.
The idea they’re “rebuilding” by any recognizable version of the term has always been farfetched. They’re not selling roster players for future assets, which hamstrings the future potential, and they don’t want to give up assets to insulate the main roster that could be better but just isn’t good enough to win by itself.
Do the Flyers trade for Thomas? Probably not. In fact, it’s probably safe to sit here and with certainty say they won’t. But that bears the question- what the hell are we doing here? Are they really going to let another opportunity for a roster upgrade to pass them by without so much as an attempt to acquire him? Especially in a summer where the options at center are insanely limited to begin with?
What’s the plan if they pass on Thomas? Are they just going to run back a top three center group of Couturier-Dvorak-Cates again? Because that simply can’t happen (despite the fact that all three are under long-term contracts.) They’ve already shot down rumors they’d be interested in Seattle’s Shane Wright. They could overpay Nick Schmaltz in free agency, if he makes it that far, but he’s 30 years old and will probably demand more than than five-year, $8.1 mil AAV Thomas does.
If Briere wants to keep pretending that the playoffs are a possibility, he’s going to have to make a move that proves it, and he has to do it soon. He’s already fallen out of favor with a surprisingly large percentage of the fanbase, and if the stale product isn’t shaken up at the deadline or during the 2026 offseason, Briere and the rest of the front office regime will find themselves in the unemployment line soon enough, just like their predecessors who made the exact same mistakes.
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
photo credit: nhl.com
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