The Philadelphia Flyers are officially done with the Ivan Fedotov experiment, but Sunday’s trade with the Columbus Blue Jackets comes with pros and cons.
For now, the Flyers are $3.275 million lighter on the salary cap, which, for all intents and purposes, was the main draw of the trade for Philadelphia.
Now, the Flyers won’t have to concern themselves with balancing the salary cap when needing to call up injured players if necessary, which was prudent for Tyson Foerster and his situation earlier this summer, for example.
By extension, it’s now a two-man net in Philadelphia.
The writing was on the wall for Fedotov once the Flyers brought in Dan Vladar from Calgary on July 1, thought it was unclear at the time if the hulking Russian was AHL-bound or a trade candidate because of his salary.
Clearly, based on Sunday’s trade with the Blue Jackets, the Flyers weren’t willing to risk losing Fedotov to waivers, and the Blue Jackets were willing to pay a minor cost to jump the line.
Flyers GM Danny Briere said previously that, over a full season, teams often need more than just their two goalies, and adding competition at the position was paramount in acting on that philosophy.
That competition now really only applies to incumbent starter Sam Ersson, who is going to have to fend off Vladar for starts all season long.
As for the AHL, the Flyers have only two serious options in Aleksei Kolosov, whom Keith Jones warned the public not to write off, and Carson Bjarnason – two top-100 picks who are the Flyers’ homegrown talents at the position.
It should be telling that Kolosov is already in Philadelphia and participating in informal skates with his teammates.
As long as Kolosov and Bjarnason remain healthy, the Flyers are all-in on developing their youth in the AHL with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms this season, which starts with the goalies and extends out to other prospects like Oliver Bonk and Denver Barkey.
That’s a philosophical shift even from just a year ago, when the Flyers had Eetu Makiniemi (a free agent addition) and Cal Petersen under contract with Kolosov and Fedotov in the fold.
Speaking of Bjarnason and the Phantoms, I didn’t think Bjarnason had a bad rookie camp, but he wasn’t great, either.
Fedotov was part of the Flyers up until Sunday, so it was plausible that Bjarnason could have been sent to the ECHL Reading Royals to play consistently while Fedotov and Kolosov platooned for the Phantoms.
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Obviously, the Flyers didn’t view that as something was necessary, and jettisoning Fedotov allows them to get Bjarnason in right away while benefitting the NHL roster at the same time.
I would still expect Kolosov to get the lion’s share of starts in Allentown, but Bjarnason needs to and will play his portion of games, too.
All in all, the Fedotov deal was a rather clear slam dunk for the Flyers, who cleared a mammoth cap hit off their books and still got a positive asset in return.
Fedotov, of course, went through a lot to make his dream come true in the NHL with the Flyers, and I wish him all the best in Columbus going forward.
He’s a talented player with a big personality that matches his size, and he’s a nice guy by all accounts.
Now, he and the Flyers will move onto new chapters.
