Game 62 Preview: Flyers vs. Islanders
In their final game before the NHL's trade deadline, interim head coach Mike Yeo's Philadelphia Flyers (19-31-11) will host Barry Trotz's New York Islanders (26-24-9) at the Wells Fargo Center on Sunday afternoon. Game time is 2:00 p.m. ET (TNT, 97.5 The Fanatic).
The Flyers enter this game coming off a 3-1 road loss to the Ottawa Senators on Friday. The game was tied at 1-1 entering the third period, but the Senators scored power play and empty-net goals to seal the win.
On Saturday, the iconic Flyers career of longtime captain Claude Giroux officially came to an end. The Flyers traded Giroux, Lehigh Valley Phantoms forwards Connor Bunnaman and German Rubtsov plus a 2024 fifth-round draft pick to the Florida Panthers. In return, Philadelphia received right winger Owen Tippett, a conditional 2024 (or 2025) first-round draft pick and a 2023 fourth-round pick.
Tippett will make his Flyers debut against the Islanders. He will wear No. 74. The Flyers are also waiting to find out if Gerry Mayhew clears waivers. They will know at 2:00 p.m. today. Philadelphia is not expected to put a waiver claim in on Nashville defenseman Phil Myers. Just 14 months ago, the Flyers were considering whether Myers could eventually slide up to the top pairing with Ivan Provorov but his stock has fallen precipitously since then.
The Islanders enter this game on a six-game point streak (5-0-1) but still buried 19 points below the wildcard cutoff with 23 games remaining on their schedule. Brock Nelson scored a hat trick in a 4-2 win over Dallas on Saturday while Semyon Varlamov made 37 saves in goal. Defenseman Ryan Pulock also scored for the Islanders.
Flyers head coach Mike Yeo will speak to the media at 11:30 a.m. today regarding Tippett and lineup combinations for this game. Chuck Fletcher will discuss the Giroux trade at noon.
For an in-depth game preview see "Five Things" on PhiladelphiaFlyers.com.
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Understanding the Giroux Trade
The short version of the Claude Giroux trade is this. The impending unrestricted free agent was only willing to waive his no-movement clause to go to one team: the Florida Panthers. This information leaked around NHL circles several weeks ahead of Saturday's trade, preventing the Flyers from being able to play competing offers against one another.
With Flyers GM Chuck Fletcher essentially boxed in unless Giroux was willing to expand the number of destinations he'd consider, Florida general manager Bill Zito more or less stuck to his guns with the trade offer for Giroux. Zito was not going to bid against himself by offering sweeteners in the form of additional prospects.
The reason why the first-round pick the Flyers acquired from Florida for Giroux is not until the 2024 Draft (2025 if the 2024 pick turns out to be a top-10 selection) is that Florida traded its 2023 first-rounder to Montreal on Wednesday for defenseman Ben Chiarot; one day before Giroux played his 1,000th game as a Flyer. Giroux coveted that milestone, understandably, and was not going to waive his NMC ahead of it. Florida already did not have a 2022 first-round pick.
Hence, when the deal finally went down, the Flyers took the next first-round pick the Panthers hold, which is two years from now.
The inclusion of Phantoms players Connor Bunnaman and German Rubtsov in the trade largely came about because neither player figures any longer in the Flyers NHL roster plans. With two contract slots now opened up, the organization has slots available to sign all three among Bobby Brink, Ronnie Attard and Noah Cates. The organization expects to get all three signe before the end of this season.
Tippett is high-risk, high-reward acquisition. He was a top-10 draftee because of his natural combination of size, speed and a heavy shot but his development process has been frustrating. He has been inconsistent in production and engagement and developing a two-way game remains a work in progress. If he clicks, however, there's still significant upside.
The first-round pick is too far off to be an immediate asset but is something the Flyers have in their back pocket to either use or eventually trade as part of a future trade.
The Flyers were never going to get a haul for Giroux unless they could get multiple teams bidding. When it became widespread knowledge that Giroux would only go one other place if he didn't ride out the season here, the leverage favored Florida.
The bigger lesson here is one of the dangers of a full no-movement clause for the duration of a long-term contract rather than having the NMC switch to a partial no-trade clause in the final season (or two seasons) of a deal. Giroux's contract overall aged well for the Flyers but, when the time came to finally say goodbye, Giroux held all the cards.
There's no villain here. Giroux had every right to make his own interests his one and only priority in waiving his NMC, just as it was Mats Sundin's prerogative his final year in Toronto to nix the idea of accepting a trade (and then leaving as unrestricted free agent).
In the summer of 2010, when the Flyers needed to move Simon Gagne's contract for cap reasons, the player had every right to refuse to waive (which he did initially) and then limit his acceptable destinations to one club (Tampa Bay). The Flyers that summer had a one-for-one trade offer from Boston of goalie Tim Thomas for Gagne but, apart from the trade being a money-for-money exchange with no cap relief, Gagne at the time was unwilling to waive (Thomas was apparently willing to do so on his end). This story is in the late Jay Greenberg's Flyers at 50 book. Limited to trading with Tampa Bay, the Flyers ended up having to accept depth defenseman Matt Walker -- who turned out to not even be a healthy player -- in exchange for Gagne.
Back in 2007, Peter Forsberg was only willing to accept a trade to the Nashville Predators as a rental but he and his agent, Don Baizley, agreed to keep it quiet in order to allow the Flyers to play multiple offers -- most notably one from the San Jose Sharks -- off one another to increase the trade price. As a result, the Flyers were able to get a young NHL roster player (Scottie Upshall), a then highly regarded prospect (defenseman Ryan Parent) and a first-round pick (flipped back to Nashville after the season for the rights to Kimmo Timonen and Scott Hartnell) in exchange for Forsberg.
These are also examples of how big of a difference it makes to have trading partner competition leverage versus lacking it.
There is a piece-by-piece analysis of the trade posted later today on PhiladelphiaFlyers.com that puts the trade in its full context. Alternatively, if you prefer the details broken down in podcast form, Jason Myrtetus and I did so on the March 20 edition of Flyers Daily.
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Phantoms Top Springfield Again
For the second straight night, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms skated to a road win over the Atlantic Division leading Springfield Thunderbirds. On heels of a 3-1 victory on Friday, the Phantoms claimed a 7-4 decision on Saturday evening.
Wade Allison and team captain Cal O'Reilly scored twice apiece for the Phantoms on Saturday, while Isaac Ratcliffe, Tanner Laczynski (goals in back-to-back games) and Charlie Gerard tallied once apiece.