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With Just Hours to go before the Draft, Briere is showing that he is Willing to Go “ALL IN” to Improve his Club
Photo Credit: SKA St. Petersburg
With the 2024 NHL Draft (which will be held in Las Vegas, Nevada this year) now only a few hours away from commencement, the Flyers General Manager Danny Briere has shown that he is willing to ANTE UP and go ALL IN to improve his club.
And why shouldn’t he? Especially after his gamble of selecting Russian forward Matvei Michkov with the seventh overall pick last year (who at the time was under contract for three more years to play in the KHL) just paid off after the news broke earlier this week that Michkov’s team, SKA St. Petersburg has officially let him out of his deal so he could chase his dream of playing in the NHL.
With a year now under his belt as the Flyers GM, Danny has now come to The Neon City armed with his best poker face, ready to take on some high-stakes action. He has a lot of chips with him in which to play with, that include multiple first-round picks in this year’s draft as well as multiple in the 2025 draft. With that being said, that leads us to the team’s latest rumor that Dealing Danny has already tried to make a move by offering up their 12th overall pick this year, a roster player, and a 2025 first-round pick to Columbus, for the Blue Jackets 4th overall pick in this year’s draft.
Now, while the Blue Jackets have turned down this trade offer, it doesn’t mean they won’t revisit the idea on the draft floor or that Philly won’t be trying to make a similar one with another team within the top five in order to try and get a prospect who could quite possibility make the Flyers opening night roster next season out of camp.
I don’t know about you, but I like this idea given the fact that with Michkov becoming available now instead of 2-3 years from now, it has sped up their rebuild significantly. Philadelphia last season surprised a lot of people with their play, so much so that they were able to hold down a playoff spot in the Metropolitan Division for well over 100 straight days before folding during the last two weeks of the season.
But, with that in mind and the addition of possibly the second-best player to come out of last year’s draft now in the mix, there is no better time than now to backdoor some people and come out once again on top.
The only question is, who did Briere have in mind to acquire with that fourth overall pick? My guess would be one of Michkov’s fellow Russian comrades.
The obvious choice would have been to go after Matvei’s former SKA teammate, Ivan Demidov. Ivan is a 6’0, 192-pound skilled puck handler whose distributing skills would pair perfectly with Michkov’s elite finishing ability.
This past season, Demidov played primarily for SKA’s 1946 MHL (Junior Hockey League) Team, where in 30 regular season games, he was able to produce 23 goals and 37 assists for 60 points. And if that two-points-per-game average wasn’t impressive enough, the fact that he was able to maintain a +47 average should be.
But with the possibility that Demidov would already be off the board come the fourth overall pick, Briere could have also been looking to draft either one of these Eastern European defensemen named Artyom Levshunov or
Anton Silayev.
Artyom Levshunov -may not be Russian, but he is from Belarus, a country that directly borders Russia and only gained its independence from them in 1991 after the fall of the Soviet Union. What’s most intriguing about Levshunov is that this 6’2, 209-pound right-hand shot defender is probably the most NHL-ready blueliner in this draft class. Because instead of playing oversees Artyom was able to kick start the learning process of the North American style game by playing in the USHL for the Green Bay Gamblers in 22-23 and for the Michigan State Spartans of the NCAA this past season, where he was able to post nine goals and 26 assists for 35 points in only 38 games played.
Artyom would bring the team four-way skating mobility, which allows
him to cycle the puck with ease around the offensive zone, making him a true power play threat, an attribute that the Flyers desperately need to add to their arsenal.
Anton Silayev
Is still a relatively raw prospect whose immense size of 6’7 and 207 pounds, when paired with his elite skating ability, has seen his stock rise immensely. So much so that before this past season started, most experts didn’t even have him ranked on their draft boards. But I guess when you’re that big and can skate as well as he can, it’s hard not to be spotted by scouts who are in the stands.
If Anton can find a way to add some aggression and physicality to his game this summer, he could find his way onto an NHL roster sooner rather than later.
Any of these players would make good additions to the Flyers prospect pool, not to mention help to ease Michkov’s transition to the NHL. But time will tell if Briere will be able to get his way by trying to move up in the draft to select one of them. We will just have to tune in tonight to find out.
How did the NHL get to the point where they are handing out No Movement/Trade Clauses like Candy?
Photo Credit Lenny Redkoles
With the Philadelphia Flyers General Manager Danny Briere trying to find some way to create cap space before free agency commences on July 1st, yet another player has blocked a deal from happening.
Recently, the Flyers were searching for a way to prevent them from having to shell out $5,875,000 again to an underperforming 35-year-old winger in Cam Atkinson. Who was only able to accumulate 13 goals and 15 assists for 28 points this past season. Folks, if you do the math, it adds up to him making $214,285.71 per point, and at least in my mind, that doesn’t cut it. But, after the team had worked really hard laying out a deal that would alleviate at least some of the burden with them possibly having to retain some of his contract, Cam, who still holds a modified no-trade clause at this the last year in his contract nixed the deal because he did not wish to play for the San Jose Sharks who the deal was in place with.
But, as far as the team goes, this is not the first time this has happened. In fact, since the official induction of the No Trade Clause (NTC)/No Movement Clauses (NMC) back in 2005, CBA’s that included the initiation of the Salary Cap. In the past the Flyers have had multiple stars block trades from happening. For instance, Giroux blocked a supposed very lucrative return from the Colorado Avalanche from occurring before the team had to eventually settle for what they could get from Florida (which, lucky for them, turned out ok, I guess). But their bad luck extends beyond that. It also includes players from other teams’ example being when defenseman Torey Krug from the St. Louis Blues blocked a trade that would have brought him to Philly using his no trade clause.
Now, long before the 2005 CBA made it official, players were asking for and receiving no-trade clauses/no-movement clauses in their contracts, but they were only handed out to elite players who were faces of the team’s franchise. A guy who a team would draft and hopefully want to keep until they decide to hang up their skates for the last time. But, now it has just gotten out of hand.
Take the Flyers, for example. We already talked about Atkinson having one but that was gifted to him by Columbus’ former GM Jarmo Kekalainen some years ago. When Chuck Fletcher was in power, he handed out like candy for example when he signed Travis Sanheim to an eight year $50 million deal that pays him $6.25 annually until 2031. Chuck gave him a full no-trade clause for the first four years of the deal and a modified no-trade clause for the last four years. This means if the Flyers ever wished to trade him, Sanheim would be allowed to come up with a list of 12 teams he would be able to reject a trade to. Another Fletcher folly was Sean Couturier’s eight-year $62 million deal. Where Chuck gave Coots a full NMC until 2029 when he will be 36 years old, and a modified no-trade clause in his final season of the deal, that’s a long time to retain that right, especially after having had multiple seasons where he has not played entire seasons or half seasons due to injury. At least those players are considered top-line players and not fourth-line brawlers like Nic Deslauriers, who good old Chuck gave out a modified no-movement clause to in the first two years of his four year seven million dollar deal he signed him to back in 2022.
Even though I had more faith in Briere in this respect when he took the job, he ended up giving in and allowed a utility defenseman in Nick Seeler to receive a no-trade clause for the first two years of his new contract.
I get the players and their union wanting to fight for this, given the fact that these players have families and whole lives outside of hockey to think about, but at the end of the day, these clauses were made to be given to the elite, not some a random scrub player who doesn’t even make the roster every night. By allowing this, franchises are putting themselves into compromising situations that could have been avoided. And because of that, they are being forced to make drastic unwanted changes to their roster, like moving out other players that they would otherwise like to keep in order to combat the bad decisions made prior when they agreed to sign a player who was good a few years ago when they signed him but has underachieved ever since.
It may be a competitive market out there. Teams may have to give a little in order to make a deal with a player they want, in order to prevent others from doing just that. Still, if the owners came together on this issue and refused to offer this once luxury bargaining chip to players who don’t deserve it, they could shift the power back in their direction. If they don’t, they will continue to be snake-bitten by their bad contractual decisions for years to come.
Prospect Watch: Rocco Pelosi
Photo Credit: https://puckpreps.com/
While other websites out there are scrambling to gather information on this year’s NHL Draftees because they neglected to follow what they were doing all year long, we here at Prospect Watch have already been there and done that, so, in an effort to keep you up to date on all the latest and greatest developing young talents from around the world today we decided to dive even deeper into the prospect pool with this article to talk about a fifteen-year-old phenom who won’t even be available until the 2027 Draft.
That player’s name is Rocco Pelosi. Now, what makes Rocco unique in my mind is that he is a local prodigy, a Sewell, New Jersey native who is taking the hockey world by storm right now.
And, if for some reason you haven’t seen the hundreds of videos of him and his team on YouTube and or numerous other social media platforms, you’ll be eager to know that Pelosi played for the Mount St. Charles Academy’s 14U AAA Team last year. Where this 5’10, 154-pound center was able to compile an unheard-of 87 goals and 83 assists for 170 points through just 64 games played this year! Folks, to save you the math, that means he averaged 1.35 goals per game and tallied 2.65 points per game this season.
But don’t get it twisted, Mount St. Charles wasn’t just playing games against your local rinks teams this past season; they spent the year traveling around North America to compete against some of the best clubs around. Teams like the Huron Perth Lakers, who they beat to win the Florida Exposure Cup, the Pens Elite to take the Northeast Pack Championships, and the legendary Shattuck St. Mary’s Hockey Club to claim this year’s National Championship (a team, mind you that has produced such NHL legends as Sidney Crosby, Jonathan Toews, and Nathan Mackinnon).
And, so that it sinks in on how great Rocco could potentially be, let me share with you how his accolades from this season compare to Nathan Mackinnon’s from his 14U season with Shattuck St. Mary’s. Back in the 2009-2010 season, when Nathan played for SSM, he was only able to put up 54 goals and 47 assists for 101 points through 58 games played, which acquits to a margin of difference of 33 goals and 69 points!
Now, at this point in the article, I usually try to break down each prospect’s strengths and point out some weaknesses in their game. But, honestly, it’s hard to do at the present time because Rocco’s level of play is off the charts. I mean, it’s to the point where he can do whatever he wants while he’s out on the ice—leaving me no holes in his game to point out. Will that change in time? Probably, when he reaches a level of competition where he is playing against young men who are at least three or four years older than him, but as of right now, all we can do is sit back and watch in amazement.