The Flyers Finally Commit To A Rebuild, Trade Joel Farabee And Morgan Frost To Calgary
Len Redkoles. Getty Images.The Flyers have been stuck in hockey purgatory for quite some time now. Not good enough to be a contender in the playoffs, but never bad enough to bottom out and load up on high end talent through the draft. The issue, obviously, is that they've never committed to a rebuild. For years, the Flyers have tried to get away with a "retooling" or "restructuring". That lends itself to perpetual mediocrity.
It's been especially bad over the last few seasons, but you can look back at the Brayden Schenn trade as the beginning of it. The Flyers hadn't won a playoff series since 2012. Rather than completely blow up the team, they figured they'd shake up the core a bit by trading Brayden Schenn to the Blues in exchange for Jori Lehtera, and 2 first round picks. Those picks ended up being Morgan Frost in 2017, and Joel Farabee in 2018.
These guys were supposed to be huge pieces to the future of the Flyers. But things just never really panned out the way they hoped they would. Farabee showed some signs that he could be the exact type of player that defines Flyer hockey, but he's struggled a ton over the last year. And Morgan Frost has always been just one step away from figuring it out, but never quite getting there. And now after a few more years of fooling themselves into thinking they're just one or two pieces away from being a contender again, the Flyers have finally committed to a rebuild by trading both of them away to Calgary.
Joel Farabee and Morgan Frost to the Flames in exchange for Andrei Kuzmenko, Jakob Pelletier, a 2nd round pick in 2025, and a 7th round pick in 2028.
We'll talk about the return in a minute here, but here are the two most important parts of this trade. 1) Joel Farabee's contract is now off the books. He still has 3 more years left on his contract with a $5M AAV cap hit. Getting that $5M off the books, along with whatever extension Frost would have signed, opens up some precious cap space for Danny Briere to work with this summer. And 2) it signals that the Flyers are willing to move on from guys that would be considered part of this team's current core in order to set themselves up for the future. But with the salary cap going up, and now Farabee's contract cleared off, the biggest thing here is Danny Briere is setting himself up to be able to land a bigger target.
Now as far as the players involved here go, Andrei Kuzmenko is an interesting return. He's got a high ceiling, and a low floor. You can't exactly be sure what you're getting out of him. He was a 39-goal scorer two seasons ago in Vancouver. His linemate that year was Elias Pettersson, which is definitely something to keep in the back of your mind moving forward with the amount of cap space the Flyers are opening up. But 39 goals two seasons ago, and this year he has 4 goals in 37 games. He could either be great, or he could be awful.
But the good thing with Kuzmenko is two-fold here. For starters, it's another Russian in the locker room to help Matvei Michkov adjust to life in North America. Not only is it just another Russian, but one that Michkov is already familiar with. They played together in the KHL a few seasons ago. And if for any reason Kuzmenko doesn't work out in Philadelphia, he's UFA at the end of this year. So he could end up just being a rental, but it does sound like the Flyers made this deal with the idea of keeping him around.
Advertisement
He waived his no-trade to come to Philadelphia. They told him it would be worth his time. They freed up a ton of cap space, with the cap going up next year. Does that mean they're going to try to reunite him with Elias Pettersson? Who knows. But it's at least way more of an option today than it was yesterday.
The only thing I'm not exactly crazy about with Kuzmenko is the fact that he might be haunted by a Russian ghost. Can't be having that.
As far as Jakob Pelletier goes, he could end up being a good project for the Flyers. He's still just 23-years-old so there's plenty of time for development. He's offensively skilled, but just hasn't been able to produce much at this level. He's RFA at the end of the season, so he'll probably be pretty cheap to sign to a bridge deal. If it works out, it works out. I wouldn't expect him to be much more than a bottom 6 forward, but he could end up being a damn good bottom 6 forward.
So if you're looking at this trade from the perspective of the players involved, I'd say it's a lateral trade at best for the Flyers. If anything, the Flames made out better in terms of roster players involved. Which is a good thing for the Flyers, because that means that they get worse. Which means there's a higher chance of them finishing low enough in the standings to move up in the draft lottery. You combine that with the fact that they cleared cap space and added more draft capital? This was a massive move to set the Flyers up to do whatever they want to do in the future. Whether that's Elias Pettersson, or taking a run at anybody else on the market, they now have the flexibility to make it happen. Big move for Danny Briere and Keith Jones.