Flyers trade for Bryzgalov's rights

The Flyers have acquired Ilya Bryzgalov (due to become a free agent on July 1) for Matt Clackson, a 3rd round pick next year, and a conditional pick.

No one will notice Clackson being gone, but the Flyers give up another (possibly 2) decent picks.

As for Bryzgalov, as I already stated, I think he is the best goalie out there, having high-end ability and entering the prime of his career.  I wasn't sure if he made sense for the Flyers because he is going to want a long-term, high salary deal.  Some inside sources regarding Bryzgalov's negotiations with Phoenix before they traded him;

Real_ESPNLeBrun Pierre LeBrun 

Am told by source that Bryzgalov contract demands with Coyotes were off the charts

DarrenDreger Darren Dreger 

Bryzgalov wants to be paid as a top player...not just a top goalie. Demands too rich for Yotes.

One can only hope he didn't really want to sign with Phoenix, and his demands with the Flyers will be reasonable.  I will be stunned if he signs here for less than 4 years at $5m/year.  I would actually predict he will sign at 4 or 5 years, approximately $6/year (if not a little more).

This raises a few questions;
1) Who else are the Flyers going to trade now?  Even if you assume the Flyers will not carry Zherdev, Carcillo, Nodl, Powe, Laperriere, Walker, O'Donnell and Leighton on the books, the Flyers already still have over $56m committed to players next season.  Simply signing Bryzgalov will eat up all of their currently available cap space (once the cap for next season is announced at between $62 and $63 million--the Flyers can't sign Bryzgalov until that announcement is made because he will put them over the current cap of $59.4m).  At that point, the Flyers will only have 9 forwards (no Leino) and 6 defensemen, so they will need to dump at least $5m in cap space just to fill out the roster.

One has to think the Flyers already have another trade lined up to clear salary, or else they wouldn't have pulled the trigger on this Bryzgalov trade yet.  Carter is the guy everyone is talking about, which makes sense.  I would throw Carle into the fray too, but I don't hear his name come up in rumors very often.

2) Does this say anything about Bobrovsky?  His path to the number 1 job will be blocked for several seasons.  Have the Flyers soured on him?  I guess they could send him to the AHL for a season, though that's probably unlikely.  Most likely is that the team simply decided "screw this, we need a goalie" and they'll worry about Bob later.

3) Should the Flyers be worried about mediocre postseason performances by Bryzgalov in Phoenix?  I don't think so.  He played just fine in the postseason for the Ducks, and his career postseason save percentage in the playoffs is higher than his regular season number.  The Coyotes were hardly a team primed for postseason runs, and he was one of the biggest reasons they got there in the first place.



Long story short, this is very exciting news for the Flyers.  They've got a very good goalie within their grasp, but this trade cannot be judged until Bryzgalov actually signs a contract with the Flyers and we also see what the Flyers send out the door in a subsequent trade.  Also, it's very difficult to see Leino resigning now, unless the Flyers dump Carter AND another significant contract.

Are the Flyers terrible at drafting goalies?

Just a pet project here.  Flyers fans love to complain about how the Flyers are terrible at drafting and developing goalies.  Well here's how everyone has done, by the numbers, in drafting goalies since 1995 (just to choose a round number).

Team - # of goalies selected - best picks
Anaheim - 12 - Byrzgalov (2nd), Gerber
Atlanta - 10 (since 2000) - Lehtonen (#2 ), Nurminen, Pavelec (2nd)
Boston - 12 - Raycroft
Buffalo - 13 - Biron (#16), Noronen (#21), Miller, Enroth (2nd)
Calgary - 11 - Sabourin, McElhinney
Carolina - 14 - Giguere (#13), Ward (#25)
Chicago - 15 - Leighton, Anderson (3rd), Crawford (2nd)
Colorado - 19 - Denis (#25), Aebischer, Budaj (2nd), B. Johnson
Columbus - 8 (since 2000) - Leclaire (#8), S. Mason (3rd)
Dallas - 10 - Dan Ellis (2nd), M. Smith
Detroit - 12 - Howard (2nd)
Edmonton - 15 - Markkanen, Deslauriers
Florida - 16 - Auld (2nd)
LA - 19 - Huet, Quick (3rd), Bernier (#11)
Minnesota - 9 (since 2002) - Harding (2nd)
Montreal - 10 - Garon (2nd), Halak, Price (#5)
Nashville - 15 (since 1999) - Rinne, Lindback
NJ - 11 - C. Mason
New York Isles - 17 - Luongo (#4), DiPietro (#1)
New York Rangers - 13 - LaBarbera (3rd), Holmquist, Lundquist
Ottawa - 9 - Emery (4th), Elliot
Philadelphia - 22 - Boucher (#22), Nittymaki, Cechmanek
Phoenix - 15 - Esche
Pittsburgh - 18 - Aubin (3rd), Caron (3rd), Fleury (#1)
San Jose - 16 - Toskala (4th), Kiprusoff
St. Louis - 12 - None
Tampa Bay - 17 - Norrena
Toronto - 12 - Tellqvist (3rd), Rask (#21), Riemer (4th)
Washington - 16 - Varlamov (#23), Neuvirth (2nd), Holtby (4th)
Vancouver - 14 - Schneider (#26)

Also, turns out a number of goalies of note were taken in 1994 (Storr-LA, Cloutier-NYR, Theodore-MTL, Turco-DAL, Thomas-QUE/COL, Hedberg-PHI, Nabokov-SJ, Vokoun-MTL, Grahame-BOS).  Remarkably, Thomas, Hedberg, Nabokov, Vokoun and Grahame were all taken within 10 picks of one another in the 9th round in 1994, but I digress.

Anyway, the moral of the story is that drafting a goalie is hard.  No one team has shown that they've really figured it out more than anyone else, though teams like Buffalo and Nashville have found some winners.  I've bolded a few teams, notable for their success or failure.  The Flyers have been trying their darndest to get a winner spending more picks on goalies than anyone else, and had some success but no franchise goalie.

The above chart, however, shows that getting a franchise goalie is either luck or a matter of using a top-5 pick on a can't-miss prospect.  Other #1 goalies like Niemi, Backstrom and Hiller, were undrafted.

Now if you want to fault the Flyers for not prioritizing on acquiring an established goalie, that may be another matter....

Get Carter

Until the Flyers make a move for a goalie, trade talk will swirl around Jeff Carter.  Trading Richards is not off the table, but Carter remains the more likely candidate.

Rumors have already started.  Toronto have always liked him, the Flyers could trade him for a package including Bryzgalov's rights in the Phoenix, and many other teams looking for a solid 1/2 center will be interested (LA? Dallas?).  The rumored asking price is a roster player, top prospect, and picks.  Keep in mind the point of trading Carter would be to open up cap space to fill other needs, so it doesn't make sense to get an expensive player back unless it's a goalie.

Carter is a natural trade candidate.  He is signed to a long term with a reasonable cap hit, and viewed in a 3 year window, he is one the top handful of goal scorers in the NHL.  He has an explosive wrist shot, decent size, is responsible defensively, and has the speed to separate from the defense.  All things that will keep teams perennially interested in a trade.

So what's not to like about him?
--For starters, it is my opinion that his wrist shot is very overrated.  His shot is inaccurate, and maybe more importantly his release is slow.  In his first few seasons Flyers fans referred to him as "high-and-wide" because that's where so many of his shots ended up.  You still rarely see him pick a corner, as most of goals come from simply overpowering the goalie.

--Second, he doesn't use his size consistently to hit or protect the puck.

--Third, he is a very poor passer of the puck, and as a result does not utilize his teammates.  His shot is heavy, but so is his pass.

--Fourth, and more elusively, for all his goals, he's not a smooth finisher.  Part of that is the shortcomings of his shot mentioned above, but he really has no dekes to speak off.  His game is all 'skate-fast-then-shoot'.  With all the breaks he gets with his speed he mainly just coasts in and shoots, or simply takes the puck to his backhand and tries to beat the goalie with speed.

--Fifth, and a biggie, he has mostly disappeared playoffs while guys like Richards, Briere and Giroux step up big time (though he has been injured the last two playoff seasons).

I project Carter to be a 35-40 goal 30-35 assist guy going forward.  I kind of expect his 46 goals in 08-09 to be his career high.  This is very nice production for a defensively capable center, but not really true star center production.  For the Flyers, with three other centers who are arguably just as good or better, Carter is a luxury that can be swapped out for a more pressing need.

The Carter trade talks will surely intensify up through draft day.

Blame Management?

Richards has been, and will continue to be, the center of criticism around the way the Flyers' season ended.  He is terrible with the media and is apparently not a vocal leader.  Sometimes I think of him as "Captain Mumbles".  A lot of Flyers fans are dragging him through the mud, questioning his leadership and his heart in general.  This is more a response to the fact that he has a C on his jersey rather than his play in general.

So will the Flyers trade their captain this offseason?  It appears the option is at least on the table for the first time.

First of all, I don't buy complaints that Richards doesn't have any heart.  The guy always plays hard and generally DOES lead by example.  Still, he did not have a good season overall, and he looked to be playing at half speed down the stretch in a way that generally indicates poor conditioning or an injury (and I'm not talking about a wrist injury that affects his faceoff prowess).  To be fair though, his production wasn't too bad, and he spent much of the season with the Flyers' 3rd line wingers (Nodl, JVR through his slump, Zherdev as he passed through the lineup).

Given that this criticism is revolving around his captaincy, forget his on-ice play for a moment and just focus on his performance in his role as a captain.  Holmgren and others have defended him saying he could improve on certain captaincy skills, and that he is "a quiet kid."  Okay, sounds plausible.  The question that raises with me however, is that the Flyers already knew he was a quiet kid when they named him captain---this can't be a surprise.

Put differently, assuming Richards' issues with the media and vocal leadership is a real problem, is management to blame for making Richards the captain in the first place and putting him a role for which he was not suited?  Even if you take for granted that Richards was destined to be the captain of the Flyers someday, timing is always relevant.

In some ways I was surprised the Flyers were so eager to name another young captain after the Flyers named Lindros the youngest captain in the league, which didn't exactly turn out for management.  Young captains can occasionally work (think Jon Toews), but isn't that more the exception than the rule?

The Flyers made Richards captain before the 2008-09 season, when he was coming off a breakout year offensively and the Flyers advanced to the Conference Finals in the playoffs.  He was 23 at the time, young by any standard for a NHL captain.  The Flyers locker room at the time wasn't exactly full of captain candidates, with the other possible candidates being Gagne, Knuble and Timonen.  Reportedly Gagne turned down the captaincy years before, Knuble was in the last year of a contract, and Timonen had only been with the team for 1 season.  (In hindsight, Timonen's level-headed veteran personality probably would've been a good fit.)

It's been said that the Flyers can't take away the C from Richards, and that he is either the captain of the team or will have to be traded away.  Captain in hockey may be like a QB in football--they get too much credit when things go right and too much blame when things go poorly.  Ultimately I think it would be a shame if the Flyers feel like they have to trade away a hard working 2-way center in his prime because he wasn't a good fit at captain at this point in his career, and management will have to look back and question the decision they made 3 years ago.

Postseason Scene Set

Nothing is actually going to happen with the Flyers for several weeks, until the playoffs end and the draft approaches, but the storylines are being set.  It's impossible to know which of the many rumors to believe, but recurring themes seem to be that Richards and Laviolette aren't getting along and that there may be a rift between vets and younger players.  As a result, the trade of Mike Richards, once unthinkable, is actually a realistic (though pretty small) possibility.  


Here's one sign of veteran discord from the level headed Timonen:
-"The better team won. It's a fact. We just couldn't get going for some fucking reason"
-"That's what pisses me off the most. We weren't even close. There was no effort which I find unbelievable"
-On an upcoming meeting Holmgren; "I don't think we'll have coffee and cakes there"

No one is safe, as some kind of roster shakeup appears likely this offseason.  At this point however, it's impossible to identify the root causes of the issues, but seeing who the Flyers ship out this offseason will be telling.

The Injured List
-Versteeg to have abdomen surgery, though to his credit he showed no signs of it.
-Pronger back surgery.  I really hope he's healthy to start next year, because he never really was this year at any time.
-Betts finger surgery
-Leighton hip surgery
-Meszaros wrist surgery, which obviously didn't prevent him from being the team's best defensemen.
-Carter, maybe
-Hartnell, maybe
-Richards wrist surgery.  This is bizarre because it was his skating that seemed to struggle.

Different approaches to the goalie issue
I've already run down the free agent options, but there are two other ways the Flyers could attack the problem.

1)  Trade for a veteran.
Pros: Gets a proven winner
Cons: Requires trading significant assets to clear the cap space and to lure the talent.
Candidates: Nicklas Backstrom, Miika Kiprusoff
Personally I'm not too keen on trading a good player in their prime to get a season or two from a vet goalie at a huge cap hit who may be on the downside of their career.

2) Trade for a blossoming young goalie
Pros:  Get a seemingly good goalie, cheap (for a season or two at least)
Cons:  Could demand high trade return, still enter season without anyone proven
Candidates:  Cory Schneider, Jonathan Bernier, Anders Lindback, Jhonas Enroth
There is no way I trade JVR or Giroux for a young goalie, and as fun as it is to say "may the best man" between Bobrovsky and a new acquisition, this ultimately amounts to another season of hoping for the best in net.

For these reasons, I still say go free agent for goalie.

The Goalie Options

I've made clear my opinion that the Flyers must do something to stabilize their goaltending this offseason.  They have basically no cap space to work with, so sacrifices will have to be made.  Either way, here are the options (name, age, last season's numbers)

The most proven options

-Tomas Vokoun, 34, 22-28-5, 922 save percentage, $5.7m cap hit

Vokoun has consistently performed well for several season, compiling an impressive 924 save percentage over 4 years in Florida.  The thing is, he has been toiling for mediocre teams for years, so he's never seen the second round of the playoffs, so he may be an unproven commodity in the playoffs.  He likely will take a pay cut, but he will still cost you.  The Flyers would have to dump salary elsewhere to compete in the bidding for him, but it's doable without taking a hammer to the nucleus of the team.

Ilya Bryzgalov, 30, 36-20-10, 921 save percentage, $4.25m cap hit

-Bryzgalov is, in my opinion, the only real number one goalie available in the sense that he will command a long term, high salary contract, and should be entering the prime of his career.  Unless the Flyers move a Richards or Carter, they can't compete with those offers.  If there was no salary cap he is the guy I would target (I'm not troubled by his poor postseason this year), but that's not the world we live in.

Wild cards

-Dwayne Roloson, 41, 24-25-5, 913 save percentage, $2.5m cap hit

Roloson is old, and he looked like a career backup when he was 30.  He blossomed in Minnesota, and he keeps defying expectations, particularly this season with the Lightning.  He's got to retire sometime, but I suspect he'll keep playing as a long as teams will give him one year offers.  His price should be reasonable, and offering him a short term contract would work well for the Flyers if they want to leave the door open for Bobrovsky to seize the job in the next year or two.  This is assuming of course that the Lightning don't resign him, who may be eager to reward one of the catalysts for their season.

-Evgeni Nabokov, 35, 2010 numbers-44-16-10, 922 save percentage, $5.375/570k

Nabokov is a very interesting option.  One of the top goalies in the league for years, he recorded three straight 40 win seasons (only the 2nd time in NHL history someone has done that), then left for Russia last season.  He came back at a cut price with Detroit, but the Islanders claimed him and he didn't report.  There is some question about his contract status, but it appears the Isles will have him at their disposal this season at an appallingly low price of $570k, who presumably will be fielding offers from teams exactly like the Flyers.  Unless you think his skills fell apart by one year off, or that he is lazy and worthless, there is no doubt that he is a premium NHL performer.  The Flyers also reportedly made their best effort to sign him at the last draft, but Nabokov decided to go back to Russia, as presumably the Flyers didn't have the cap space to meet his demands.  All in all, I think the Flyers would be crazy not to take a stab at a goalie with his track record and at a price that would make him one of (if not the absolute) lowest paid goalies in the entire league.  There's also the Russian factor, being an experienced Russian-speaking NHL player for Bobrovsky to lean on.

Ray Emery, 28, 7-2, 926 save percentage, $500k

-Three years ago it was his attitude, and last year it was a career threatening hip injury (think Bo Jackson).  No one really doubts his ability, but there's always been something holding Emery back.  His comeback was impressive this season for the Ducks, though such a limited audition will mean he likely won't be able to command big dollars or a long contract.  This puts him in within the reach of the Flyers.  Are the Flyers up for another ride with Ray?  They were reportedly one of 3 teams Emery was negotiating with this spring, as discussed here.

Fading stars

-J.S. Giguere, 33, 11-11-4, 900 save percentage, $6m cap hit

Seems like a long time ago Giguere was a playoff hero for the Ducks (leading to that huge contract, which is finally expiring).  He's not that old, but hasn't performed at that high level in a few seasons.  I don't think he'll regain that form (which hasn't been seen for 3 years), and I think he should be no better than plan E or F for the Flyers.

-Marty Turco, 35, 11-11-3, 897 save percentage, $1.3m cap hit

Had several good season in Dallas, but a spotty playoff record there and is coming off a very disappointing year for Chicago.  He was supposed to be a bargain at that price--instead he lost the job to a rookie (who admittedly turned a lot of heads in the playoffs).  I see him in a similar light to the prospect of signing Giguere.

-Jose Theodore, 34, 15-11-3, 916 save percentage, $1.1m cap hit

Coming off a strong season, but nowhere near the goalie that won the Vezina in 2002 with a gaudy 931 save percentage, as that season has proved to be an anomaly.  Personally, I don't think very highly off him and feel comfortable just saying "no thanks."

-Pascal Leclaire, 28, 4-7, 908 save percentage, $3.8m cap hit

He was supposed to be a star for Columbus, being the #8 pick in 2001.  For a while he seemed on that track, but he lost his job to rookie phenom Steve Mason (who has himself faded).  He was shipped off to Ottawa with hopes of claiming the #1 job there long term, but disappointed.  The mediocrity of his last few seasons are probably enough to keep the Flyers away, though I wouldn't be shocked if he has a career revival.  I'm not really interested in the Flyers having another "hope-and-pray" goalie though.

Conclusion

I don't really like any of the fading star options, and I think the first options for the Flyers should be Roloson and Nabokov.  Both are proven winners (though aging), and both are affordable and will be on short term contracts that fit in with the Flyers hopes for Bobrovsky to be the long term solution.  Nabokov even has the Russian intangible in his favor.

If I were the Flyers, I'd be pushing hard for a trade with the Isles.  The Flyers don't have many prospects to deal to a young Isles team, but Matt Carle would be a start in trade discussions.

If the Flyers can't trade for Nabokov or the Lightning re-sign Roloson before he hits the market, I would sniff around Vokoun or consider Emery round 2.  Obviously the Flyers still like him somewhat based on their interest in February.

Lastly, the Flyers could trade from someone like Cory Schneider in Vancouver who looks very good but is likely stuck behind a big star for playing time, but that opens a can of worms of candidates and the trade assets required to complete a trade, so I won't go into that.

My goaltending manifesto

Goaltending has been by far the most talked about subject for the Flyers this year.  I have been very concerned about it, and at no point this season was I convinced that the Bobby Boucher tandem would be good enough to win in the playoffs.  Once the playoffs arrived, their performance was abysmal.

You can say lots of things about the role of a goaltender on a hockey team.  I would agree that you don't need a top-notch goalie to win the cup.  That said, goaltender is an important position.  IT IS NOT AN ON/OFF SWITCH, where its either on/"good-enough" or off/"not-good-enough".

Like everything other aspect of hockey, there are many degrees to the quality of a goalie's performance.  It can be great, terrible, and everything in between.  The worse your goaltending slides down the scale performance-wise, the better your team offense and team defense have to perform to compensate.  Just like a team with obvious holes in their team offense or defense will struggle to win, so will a team with a glaring hole in goal.  I don't know what percentage of importance you could assign to goaltending overall, but it's more than 0%, that's for sure.

Teams with great offense but so-so defense can win, and vice versa.  Teams with great offense but awful defense (and vice versa) cannot succeed in the playoffs.  Goaltending is not any different; no level offensive of might will render the position irrelevant.

Perhaps the only aspect of this that makes goaltending different from other aspects of the game is that goaltending needs to be a 60 minute effort.  You can step off the gas pedal on offense for stretches of a game for instance, but 58 solid minutes of play by a goalie can be destroyed by 2 bad goals allowed.  It's an intangible quality that is hard to quantify, but basically you just need your goalie to avoid soft goals and make some timely stops.  Seems unfair to the goalie when you put it this way, but that's the way it is for goalies.  A goalie can play pretty well for 50 minutes, but 10 shaky minutes with 2 or 3 goals allowed (a common occurence for Bobrovsky this season) amounts to a mediocre game when viewed as a whole.

The unfortunate truth is that the Flyers goaltending this season (and particularly down the stretch and playoffs) is hovering around the 'awful' category.  You can deceive yourself with stats or over-analyze every goal allowed and how it wasn't their fault, but most simply neither Bobrovsky (right now) nor Boucher are NHL starter-quality goalies;

-Bobrovsky is 22 year old rookie who never played in North America and is clearly not a finished product at the NHL level and was slated to spend the entire season in the AHL.

-Brian Boucher, who aside from his three stints with the Flyers, has played for 5 other NHL teams, all of whom deemed him no better than a backup and let him walk as soon as his contract was up.  He is 3 years removed from having NO NHL offers and playing for the Flyers' AHL team.

The Flyers pulled their starting goalie due to poor performance 5 TIMES in two playoff rounds.  That is staggering, I've never seen anything like it.  Other factors can contribute to that, but there is no way that can occur unless the goaltending is incredibly poor.

The Flyers must upgrade in goal to compete for the big prize.  That doesn't mean they must break the bank on a big name goalie, but the Flyers cannot ignore the position or offer half-baked solutions, just as a team with perennially bad team offense or defense must meaningfully address the issue.  They're an exciting team, but they're not so good that can cede a large mismatch in goal against most opponents and still expect to win.  Like everybody else they need to look for maximum cap value in acquiring a reliable goalie.