The Flyers are locked into the seventh overall pick for the 2023 draft, barring some sort of magic that allows (now official) GM Danny Briere to trade up. There’s also a chance, depending on the off season, that Briere makes some moves to acquire another, later first round pick, but for now let’s assume the Flyers only have the one. What position should they be targeting with that pick? Center? Winger?
Anyone but a defenseman.
It’s not that top defensive prospect David Reinbacher is bad–it’s just that the 2023 draft is loaded with high ceiling, skillful forwards the Flyers should aim to acquire instead. This is all the more important when considering the 2024 draft: it’s early, but next summer’s draft class looks like it’ll be heavy on defensemen–and the Flyers have a second first round pick from the Florida Panthers that they received in the Claude Giroux trade.
First off, the Flyers are going to be bad again next year: certainly drafting in the top ten, and maybe in the top five–most likely due to other teams getting better (there’s no way all of Anaheim, Columbus, Montreal and Arizona could be that bad again, right?) and little internal improvement after a hopefully active offseason by Briere. Going off Scott Wheeler’s early analysis of the 2024 prospect pool, there are four defensemen among the top ten–and three of them are right shots. Outside the top ten? An additional eight defensemen in the top 25, several of them right handed, that the Flyers could all have a crack at with Florida’s pick.
Yes, the current roster’s defensive corps is a mess–but the current roster doesn’t matter, the future one does. Briere and others in the organization seem to understand this rebuild will take time–and if it takes time, there’s absolutely no reason to plug present day holes if it doesn’t help the team’s future. The new front office’s draft selection this summer will demonstrate their commitment to a multi-year rebuild: 2023 is a chance to get a creative, skillful forward with top-line upside that the team desperately lacks, and 2024 is the chance to fill out the right side of the defensive corps in a single draft.
Of course, the Flyers could win the lottery next year (ha!), and if that’s the case they obviously take the best player available whatever the position. That, however, is roster construction revolving around luck, and is not a viable approach to team building. The organization should already have an eye on the 2025 draft, as well, so that they can model a roster projection three, five, even seven years from now.
Let’s do a little experiment and assume the Flyers do draft two right-shot defensemen in 2024. Suddenly, the defensive corps looks much more like that of a competitive team, provided they successfully develop players:
Cam York – 2024 1st round pick (PHI)
Travis Sanheim – 2024 1st round pick (FLA)
Emil Andrae – Ronnie Attard
Who might those players be? Assuming a top five pick for Philadelphia, and one in the late teens for Florida, maybe Artyom Levshunov on the top pair and Adam Jiricek (yes, David’s brother, the one the Flyers passed on in 2022) on the second pair. Alternatively, Ronnie Attard shows he’s a solid second pair player, and the third pair right side becomes less integral to the Flyers’ draft plans.
Predicting the future is a fool’s errand–but the Flyers should have some idea of what the roster could look like down the road, and when the ideal time to plug holes is. Drafting a defenseman this summer to fill an immediate need when there are high-end forwards available would be a mistake. Patience is essential for the long-term health of the team, and we have to hope the front office recognizes this as well.
