The NHL trade deadline will commence on March 3, 2023. It’s 20 days away, a little ways away, but it will come quickly. For the Flyers, it will be an active one, just no shockers.
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The Flyers will look to trade players on expiring deals, players like Justin Braun, James van Riemsdyk, and even Nick Seeler. They might trade Zack MacEwen, whom the Edmonton Oilers were targeting earlier in the year. But don’t look for any shockers, like moving Kevin Hayes or Ivan Provorov. Most contenders do not have cap space to afford the Hayes contract or Provorov’s cap hit, and most tend to search for expiring contracts. This does not mean that get groundwork laid for a trade can’t be made for the offseason though.
Hayes is more of an offseason move, mainly as I have previously written due to all the parameters for a deal to take place. First the Flyers would have to ask him for his 12 team list as he has a M-NTC, then the Flyers would also have to retain monies to make this deal work as he garners $7.14 million per season for the next three years. In addition to Hayes, backup goalie Felix Sandström may get moved, but that would also be an offseason move due to crippling the Lehigh Valley Phantoms if there were injuries or other situations that may arise. It has become clearly apparent that Samuel Ersson has won over Tortorella.
“There’s no date I have in mind. You find out about a player when during those really important games. This situation right now it’s all year long for me evaluating players. These thoughts will be brought up at the end of the year.” – John Tortorella on January 7, 2023
What will transpire between now and then is anyone’s guess, as contending teams will look to acquire players to fill voids on their rosters. Just don’t expect a fire sale of youth or players that are not on expiring deals. Tortorella wants to get a feel for the roster before a player is moved, as he has previously stated.
It’s better to get to know these players, and assess them properly through an entire season before saying, “We made a mistake.” Tortorella is doing his due diligence properly, and those players that are not part of solution will slowly be moved out.
Extra Credit:
Kieffer Bellows can realistically play today if he hasn’t already been claimed. For those that missed it yesterday, Bellows was placed on waivers. It will be interesting to see if the Flyers go with 11F,7D today in case.
Also, since Linus Högberg has cleared waivers. The Flyers have a total of 48 contracts out of the max of 50.
