Team: 2016-17 Philadelphia Flyers

Initial Creation Date: Jun. 11, 2016

Published: Jun. 12, 2016

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

The first thing you'll notice is the cap being over. Lecavalier's contract will come off the retained list due to his retirement and the salary cap is projected to raise to $74M. The difference equates to $740,233 left in cap space.

This roster isn't very Hexy-like. Trading away Hagg as well as a third round pick is no where near patient. However, trading those assets to acquire a player that will fill a weakness is hardly hemorrhaging, especially when defensive depth is plentiful.

Rumors have recently surfaced that Martin Hanzel is available in trade from Arizona. Hanzel. 6'6" and 236 lbs., has offensive upside. He recently had a career year in points, scoring 41 points in 64 games this passed season. Since the Flyers are currently in the market for size and scoring, Hanzel is what they are looking for. I personally don't have any dislike for Couturier or Cousins, but both of those players seemed to be used incorrectly. Couts seems to be mostly comfortable in a third line roll / shutdown center, rather than a second line point-getter. Cousins lost confidence as the season aged. During the playoffs against the Caps, It looked as though Cousins was always on his knees or shoved to his back whenever he came close to an opponent. Possibly letting him develop with the Phantoms a little more will let him reach his potential with confidence.

In order to sign some free agents, the Flyers need to shed some salary. The most obvious being Streit. With Provorov more than likely breaking the lineup out of training camp, Streit is an obvious candidate to be shipped to a team that has cap space. Read, despite his fantastic possession numbers, has dropped off in scoring. The Flyers are in much needed help when it comes to scoring and Read doesn't provide that. Especially with a $3.6M cap hit. Umberger will be bought out.

With room for cap, the Flyers will most likely sign Loui Eriksson. Eriksson is another big body with hands to put up points, consistently. He has played in almost every game in the last two seasons and has the ability to score 30 goals. Okposo is another player who could be signed, but he is smaller and less consistent than Eriksson. Both would ask for around the same amount of money, it just depends on who gets signed by a team first.

For more scoring depth, Philly will also sign Jamie McGinn. McGinn took major strides this year, showing that he can put up almost 40 points as a depth player. He isn't the most shiniest toy out there, but he will fit in well within a third line that can put up the points when needed.

All of these signings will push players like Couturier and Raffl down the depth chart. Both are good players, but are needed to fill gaps down the roster. The former "third line" of Ganger-Cousins-Read will be almost scrapped from the team, except for Cousins, making room for bigger and more productive players.

1.

2.