At first glance, the Flyers’ 2026 draft feels underwhelming. Only time will tell.
The Flyers stuck to their usual script of prioritizing size and two-way responsibility over offensive flash. It will take a few years before we know if that was the right course.
ATLANTIC CITY — You can be overwhelmed. You can be underwhelmed. Can you ever be just whelmed?
Because that’s the feelings after the Flyers’ 2026 draft. It doesn’t feel fantastic. It doesn’t feel terrible. It just feels ... there.
Is that what was conveyed by assistant general manager Brent Flahr, speaking after they wrapped things up?
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“This draft, I’ll be honest with you, there’s layers, and especially early on, our layers got cleaned out quickly. And I’ve never seen it like that before,” he said. “Even as the draft went along, but we were able to move back in the first, and then we’re able to move around and get players we’re happy with, so it worked out fine.”
Maybe that’s it. It was fine.
Yes, it’s too early to tell where this draft will land because 99% of the time, players need time to develop and grow. And there may have been something in the air because while the gambling floor of the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino had people testing their luck with the press of a button on a slot machine, on each spin of the roulette wheel, and every roll of the dice, that appears to have permeated upstairs to the Flyers’ draft room as they selected their next generation in the 2026 NHL draft.
The Black and Orange opted for long-term wait-and-see projects. (They love projects, don’t they?) And, to be fair, they have some time with the past few draft classes finally bearing fruit.
Maksim Sokolovskii, the Flyers’ first-rounder who Flahr called “a unicorn,” is a big, mean defenseman who needs to continue building his defensive game while also trying to add some offense. Goalies Martin Psohlavec and Marek Sklenička looked great at the U18s for Czechia — another Flyers trademark — but are still raw. And second-rounder Brek Liske, probably the best story of the draft, just for the fact that his dad is a diehard Flyers fan, has a solid foundation, but does have to work on his skating — where have we heard that before?
Center KJ Sauer missed most of this past season after tearing his posterior cruciate ligament the year prior and compared his style of play to that of Brady Tkachuk. Flahr said last week the Flyers could add a small, dynamic defenseman — but in the later rounds — and they got Max Laatikainen, a small Finnish defenseman they are hoping still can grow.
Whether they actually see an NHL game is truly a crapshoot anyway. But that’s always the case. In 2020, DobberProspects did a study showing that 60 NHL players from a draft class eventually make it to the NHL, which is less than 27%. TSN director of scouting Craig Button recently told NBC Sports Philadelphia that “approximately 45 players from any draft will play 350 games or more in the NHL.” That’s not a whole lot.
» READ MORE: Flyers double down on defense and in goal on Day 2 of the NHL draft
Entering this draft, since Flahr has been at the helm, the Flyers have drafted 50 players. Not counting the two previous classes, although Porter Martone and Jett Luchanko have already played NHL games, 44% have played at least one NHL game. Will this class make it? Who knows.
Now it does feel like they stayed the course and went down the path of previous drafts with a slight twist.
They again drafted for size — even though Flahr said Saturday it wasn’t a focus — with only Laatikainen of the six picks under 6 feet. In the process, they left players like dynamic but risky small defensemen Ryan Lin, Tommy Bleyl, and Xavier Villeneuve on the table in the first round and talented forwards like the Ruck Twins, Jack Hextall, J.P. Hurlbert and Brooks Rogowski.
But Flahr and general manager Danny Brière did stress that players drafted today will not help the team in the near future — so drafting a power-play specialist would not have made the atrocious power play better in the here and now — and they needed goaltending and defensive depth.
It just felt like maybe there were better options?
But who is to know today what tomorrow brings?