Without Leo Carlsson, the Flyers’ hunt for their pot of gold just got harder and longer
Adding Carlsson would have filled a huge need and put the Flyers on a faster track, perhaps. But their rise has been about maintaining roster flexibility — and still should be.
Think of the Flyers as an explorer who landed on a deserted island. On this island, deep within miles of thick jungle, is treasure. The explorer knows the treasure is there somewhere, and he aims to find it.
Leo Carlsson would have been a new machete: sharp, strong, capable of cutting through all those vines and branches and trunks to make the Flyers’ journey to those riches easier and faster. Now the explorer won’t have that tool. Now that the Anaheim Ducks have matched the five-year, $90-million offer sheet that Carlsson signed with the Flyers last week, the Flyers won’t have the steel blade that Carlsson represented as a 6-foot-3, 21-year-old, clear-cut first-line center just entering his prime.
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So where does that leave them? It means that their trek to that treasure, to their first Stanley Cup since 1974-75, will likely be slower and less certain. They may get to it eventually, but it’s going to take more time and be more costly.
Had the Ducks declined to match the Flyers’ audacious offer — and make no mistake, this gambit by Danny Brière was bold and creative, as close to a Now youse can’t leave move as an NHL general manager can make — Anaheim would have received four first-round picks from the Flyers. That price would have been steep. But the Flyers would have added Carlsson, who averaged nearly a point a game last season, is an excellent player now, and has shown every sign that he will get even better.
They need a No. 1 center, not merely for the talent and scoring touch such a player would provide, but also so they can slot their other centers — Trevor Zegras, Christian Dvorak, and Sean Couturier — more appropriately. With Carlsson (or any center of similar caliber, for that matter), Zegras would have become the second-line guy. Dvorak would have become a terrific third-line guy. And Couturier would have remained in the role he played so well in last season’s playoffs, as an outstanding fourth-line checker, faceoff-taker, and leader.
What’s more, the Flyers have a roster and a farm system with plenty of promising young players, and if this move had come to fruition, they wouldn’t have had to sacrifice any of them to fill one of their biggest holes. That’s perhaps the most disappointing aspect of this result for them: That luxury of gaining an emerging superstar without having to give up valuable players and/or prospects already within the organization likely is no longer available to them.
They’re interested in the Detroit Red Wings’ Dylan Larkin, for instance; though Larkin is 7½ years older than Carlsson, he still would fit the Flyers like a well-tailored suit. But assuming Larkin, who has a full no-movement clause, is even willing to join the Flyers, the trade package necessary to acquire him would probably have to include a player or two on their current roster. Would Larkin be worth the departure of, say, Owen Tippett and/or Denver Barkey?
Just because Brière made such a huge play for Carlsson doesn’t mean he has to answer that question, immediately or ever. The smartest thing he and the Flyers’ leadership team have done in the three years since he took over as GM has been to give themselves flexibility in improving the team. They didn’t have to shock the NHL by presenting that offer sheet to Carlsson — a proposal for a contract that has now made him the league’s highest-paid player. But they did. After years of running in place, after qualifying for the postseason for the first time since 2020, they declared that they were ready to spend again, but they made that declaration on their terms.
They have several choices for how they can proceed. They need not just a No. 1 center, but a top-pair defenseman, or at least one capable of quarterbacking a power play. They can act quickly to acquire one or both of those players, to find short-term and/or long-term answers to those lingering questions, or they can wait.
Remember: Even if they had won their duel with the Ducks for Carlsson, the Flyers wouldn’t have been considered a true contender this season for the Stanley Cup. Porter Martone, Matvei Michkov, Tyson Foerster, Jamie Drysdale, Alex Bump, Zegras: All of them have growth and development ahead of them. Yes, the Flyers’ hunt will take longer now that Leo Carlsson, that oh-so useful tool, will remain on the West Coast, but they can still find that chest of gold. They just have to take care not to get lost along the way.
