The Flyers are interested in star center Dylan Larkin. Can Danny Brière get him?
A deal for Larkin, a first-line center, would make sense for Brière. But how much would the Flyers have to give up to land him?
The Flyers need a first-line center. Everyone knows this. Everyone acknowledges this, even the Flyers themselves. Most of their best and most promising forwards — Travis Konecny, Porter Martone, Owen Tippett, Matvei Michkov — are wingers. They have salary-cap room on their roster and players and prospects and picks they can trade.
Dylan Larkin is a first-line center. Everyone knows this. Everyone acknowledges this, even the Detroit Red Wings, the only team Larkin has known over his 11-year career in the NHL. He turns 30 on July 30. Six-foot-one and 204 pounds, he has scored 30 goals or more in a season six times, including each of the last five, and is the Red Wings’ captain and a conscientious defensive player. He is amid an eight-year contract that runs through the 2030-31 season and counts $8.7 million annually against the cap.
He also told the Red Wings recently that he wants them to trade him.
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You don’t have to be hockey’s answer to Howie Roseman to see where we’re going here. A deal for Larkin — depending on what they’d have to give up to get him — would make a lot of sense for the Flyers. It would fit general manager Danny Brière’s broad plan of being open to moves that had the potential to help the team in both the short and long terms.
“We’re in a good spot, as far as the salary cap goes, as far as our picks go, as far as our prospects go,” Brière said last month. “There’s a lot of upside there. If there’s an opportunity to jump on something that could help us, yeah, it’s my job to look at everything. But I don’t feel that I’m forced to make a move just to make a move because we’ve made it into the playoffs this year.”
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The Flyers do have interest in Larkin, two team sources confirmed. But it’s believed that they are not currently among his top preferred destinations, and he has plenty of leverage in the form of a full no-trade clause.
He reportedly wants out of Detroit because of his frustration over the franchise’s direction under GM and former Red Wings great Steve Yzerman. The Red Wings have missed the playoffs for 10 consecutive seasons and have not won a postseason series since 2013, and Larkin was critical of the organization for failing to make any significant moves at this year’s trade deadline.
“We didn’t gain any momentum … and guys were kind of down about it,” he told reporters in April. “It’d be nice to add something and bring a little bit of a spark on the ice and maybe a morale boost as well.”
The Flyers generated that kind of spark this season by qualifying for the playoffs for the first time in six years, beating the Pittsburgh Penguins in the first round, and rejuvenating a dormant but still-loyal fan base. They are perceived as a team on the rise, and the expectation around the NHL, among their fans, and within their own locker room will be that they’ll not just return to the playoffs but be capable of going deeper once they get there.
Though Brière has maintained for a while now that he has no problem being patient and waiting for the Flyers’ young talent to develop further, that atmosphere will put some pressure on him to improve the roster as soon as he can.
“I know all the players are going to come back, and that’s definitely going to be their goal,” he said. “I don’t want to lower expectations, either. I think they believe they can make the playoffs again. They want another taste of it.”
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It’s plausible that Larkin will come around to the idea that the Flyers can scratch his itch for meaningful springtime hockey, and it’s difficult to imagine a hungrier, more motivated player than a star in his prime who has been on just one playoff team in his 11 years in the league.
The question that Brière and his brain trust will have to answer, of course, is, what might it take to get Larkin, and will he be worth it? Would it take, say, Tippett, Jett Luchanko, and a couple of draft picks? Would it take more? Less? Which player or players on the current roster would the Flyers be willing to sacrifice for a player who would be as fine a fit as Larkin?
The Flyers’ offseason just went from interesting to fascinating, fast.
