After losing Ryan Poehling in the Trevor Zegras trade, the Philadelphia Flyers need another reliable two-way center.

While Zegras may very well end up converting back to center full-time, he's not the guy the Flyers want playing high-pressure defensive minutes, and especially not on the penalty kill.

There are a quite a few interesting veteran options for that archetype of player on the NHL free agent market this year, but the Flyers, just like at the goalie position, will face hot competition from Stanley Cup contenders.

Names like Radek Faksa, Nick Bjugstad, and Nico Sturm would be fantastic stopgap options, but with a little extra searching, the Flyers can find themselves a more permanent replacement in Joe Veleno.

Veleno, 25, is a former first-round pick who is set to be bought out by the Seattle Kraken after being traded by the Chicago Blackhawks for Andre Burakovsky last week.

Veleno was, of course, already traded once this season, with the Detroit Red Wings bringing in Petr Mrazek and Craig Smith and sending Veleno to Chicago.

All in all, the 2024-25 season was a tougher go for the former 30th overall pick, although Veleno's five points in 16 games with Chicago was markedly better than the 10 points he had in 56 games with the Red Wings.

Coming into the year, Veleno was fresh off a career-high 28 points with the Red Wings, emerging as a strong penalty killer and a physical presence.

Veleno's GAR card above is similar to Poehling's before he joined the Flyers; Veleno's is more well-rounded, while Poehling was in the 80th percentile of defense due to some elite penalty kill play.

If the Flyers are in on Veleno, they'll get some intel from defenseman Jamie Drysdale, who won the 2019-20 IIHF U20 Men's World Championships with Veleno and Canada a few years back.

Going back another year, Veleno played with Flyers forward Owen Tippett and former Flyers center Morgan Frost on the 2018-19 U20 Canada team.

The 25-year-old is having a two-year, $4.55 million contract cut short with the buyout, so it's unlikely Veleno will cost the Flyers much more than something in the range of $1 million. 

The 6-foot-1, 200-pound forward has thrown over 100 hits in each full season of his NHL career and is a respectable 46.6% for his career in the faceoff dot.

The combination of size, potential, physicality, and versatility should be attractive to a smaller Flyers team, and Veleno is much more seasoned than Rodrigo Abols, for example.

He should be one of their top targets heading into the start of NHL free agency Tuesday.

Flyers, in need of goalie help, agree to terms with Vladar on 2-year deal originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

The Flyers had to address the goaltending position this offseason.

They did that Tuesday in the form of Dan Vladar. The club and the 27-year-old agreed to terms on a two-year, $6.7 million contract. The deal has an average annual value of $3.35 million.

Vladar is expected to form a tandem with Samuel Ersson, who has one more year left on his contract. Ivan Fedotov and Aleksei Kolosov also have one more year to go on their respective deals and will compete for playing time.

At 6-foot-5, 209 pounds, Vladar comes to the Flyers after spending the last four seasons with the Flames. He’s coming off a career-high 30 appearances (29 starts) in which he went 12-11-6 with a 2.80 goals-against average and an .898 save percentage.

His best season came in 2021-22, when he went 13-6-2 with a 2.75 goals-against average, .906 save percentage and two shutouts. Time will tell if Vladar is the short-term answer to helping the Flyers stabilize in net.

Last season, the Flyers had an .872 save percentage, the worst in the NHL. The season before that, they were tied with the Senators for the league’s worst mark at .884. It has arguably been the Flyers’ most costly flaw since Carter Hart left the team in January 2024 because of the Hockey Canada sexual assault case.

On Day 1 of NHL free agency, the Flyers also added center Christian Dvorak and defensemen Noah Juulsen and Dennis Gilbert.

Flyers add another center in offseason by agreeing to terms with Dvorak originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

The Flyers opened Day 1 of NHL free agency Tuesday by agreeing to terms with Christian Dvorak on a one-year, $5.4 million contract.

The 29-year-old center is coming off a season in which he played all 82 games for the Canadiens, putting up 12 goals and 21 assists.

A little over a week ago, the Flyers started their addition down the middle by trading for 24-year-old Trevor Zegras.

Center has been a position of need for the Flyers. Dvorak gives the Flyers a solid bottom-six boost after they lost Ryan Poehling in the Zegras trade.

Dvorak, a 6-foot-1, 190-pounder, won 55.2 percent of his faceoffs over four seasons with Montreal. Last season, he started in the defensive zone a career-high 69 percent of the time, so he’s a center who can be trusted in tough spots.

In 2019-20, playing under Rick Tocchet with the Coyotes, Dvorak put up career highs in goals (18) and points (38). In the playoffs last season with the Canadiens, he had a pair of goals over five games.

The Flyers have to like the one-year commitment to Dvorak. It shouldn’t block anyone and it gives the Flyers a good look at if Dvorak will be a fit.

Right now, the Flyers’ competition at center includes Dvorak, Zegras, Sean Couturier, Noah Cates, Jett Luchanko, Rodrigo Abols and Karsen Dorwart.

With the trade of Joel Farabee and Morgan Frost, Tony DeAngelo, Andrei Kuzmenko, Cal Petersen and Jakob Pelletier coming off the books and the NHL salary cap rising, the Flyers had some room to spend this offseason.

They opened free agency with $15.14 million in cap space, according to PuckPedia.com. They ended up adding Dvorak, goaltender Dan Vladar and defensemen Noah Juulsen and Dennis Gilbert. They still need to re-sign restricted free agent defenseman Cam York.

“There’s a little bit of a window to add from the outside,” general manager Danny Briere said about free agency in April. “We’re not going to be able to fix every problem, but it would be nice to be able to, if the situation is right, add a player or two to come in and help on that front. That also should help taking a step forward.”

The Flyers have not changed their rebuilding plans, but they do need and want to get better this season. They hit “rock bottom” last season and the 2025-26 campaign will be Year 3 under Briere and president of hockey operations Keith Jones.

The club also added a depth center by agreeing to terms with Lane Pederson on a one-year, two-way, $775,00 contract. The 27-year-old is projected to open this season with AHL affiliate Lehigh Valley.

(More coming…)

Oilers trade left wing Viktor Arvidsson to Bruins for 2027 draft pick originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

The Boston Bruins have made a trade with the Edmonton Oilers shortly before the NHL free agent market opens Tuesday.

The Oilers are sending forward Viktor Arvidsson to the Bruins in exchange for a 2027 fifth-round draft pick, the teams announced. Arvidsson waived his no-trade clause to allow the deal to go through, per TSN’s Pierre LeBrun.

Arvidsson is entering the final season of a two-year, $8 million contract ($4 million salary cap hit). The Bruins will have about $8.7 million in cap space after this trade.

The 32-year-old left wing provides some much-needed scoring depth to Boston’s lineup.

He had a bit of a down 2024-25 season with the Oilers, scoring 15 goals with 12 assists in 67 games. He scored 26 goals for the Los Angeles Kings during the 2022-23 campaign. He has scored 20-plus goals five times in his career.

Arviddson can be a dangerous player off the rush and isn’t afraid to fire pucks on net — two attributes the Bruins need to add.

There were 380 forwards last season who logged at least 500 even-strength minutes, per Natual Stat Trick, and Viktor Arvidsson ranked 19th with 9.56 shots per 60 minutes. He’s not afraid to fire the puck on net.

Arvidsson isn’t going to be a huge difference-maker for the Bruins, but he’s a solid buy-low addition.

New Bruins head coach Marco Sturm was an assistant during Arvidsson’s first season with the Kings in 2021-22, so he already has some familiarity with the Swedish forward.