While the 2025-26 season was ultimately a success for the Philadelphia Flyers that ended with an appearance in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs, they have their work cut out for them if they want to make it back there again next season.
It wasn't for a lack of effort that the Flyers ended up making few moves this offseason. Their $90 million offer sheet to Leo Carlsson would have changed the team's outlook, both in the present and the future, drastically, but the Anaheim Ducks stood their ground and retained their franchise player.
Aside from that, Joseph Woll, if and when healthy, should be a considerable upgrade over Sam Ersson at the goalie position, and Noel Acciari replaces a declining Garnet Hathaway with the added bonus of positional flexibility.
The Flyers did, however, get slightly worse defensively, replacing the puck-moving Emil Andrae with a stereotypical bruiser in Simon Benoit.
That is not something that will help their average transition game and abhorrent power play, even if Andrae was never really given power play opportunities anyway.
Simply put: other teams in the Metropolitan Division improved more than the Flyers did, and upgrades for Philadelphia are going to have to come from within.
Flyers Must Follow NHL Blueprint for High-Value ContractsMany NHL teams are signing their young stars to big contracts early, but the Philadelphia Flyers have shown a preference to wait for certainty and guarantees before paying up.No. 3: A much better power play
Here's an example: the Washington Capitals finished last season outside of the playoffs, had the eighth-worst power play in the NHL, and allowed the third-most shorthanded goals.
Then they went out and added Jordan Kyrou, Alex Tuch, and Boone Jenner in free agency.
If the Flyers want to be back in the playoffs, with a team like that on their heels, they cannot have the worst power play in the NHL again, and they cannot allow the fourth-most shorthanded goals in the league again.
Rookie Porter Martone enters the 2026-27 season as the de facto replacement for Bobby Brink, who was traded to Minnesota for David Jiricek at the NHL trade deadline.
Martone and Jiricek, 19 and 22, respectively, have clear paths to making meaningful long-term impacts for the Flyers, and players with their talents need to do some major damage on the power play, too.
While Martone's roster spot is all but guaranteed, Jiricek will need to fend off Simon Benoit and/or Oliver Bonk for a roster spot and playing time, but his offensive exploits should give him the leg up heading into training camp next month.
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No. 2: Health is wealth
We'll come back to the power play and offense shortly, but as mentioned above, Joseph Woll, when healthy, is a massive upgrade over Sam Ersson.
Ersson was just 14-11-5 in 29 starts and 33 games played for the Flyers last season as Dan Vladar's understudy, and while he did end on a higher note, the overall performance wasn't good enough.
Vladar, 28, played 52 regular season games for the Flyers last year, but between 2021 and 2025, played no more than 30 regular season games in a single campaign.
Injuries and a lack of a featured role were factors in that, but the Flyers will need Vladar to stay on the ice and then be able to replicate last season's 29-14-7 record, 2.42 GAA, and .906 save percentage.
For Woll, the story is no different.
The ex-Toronto Maple Leafs warden played 39 games last season, 42 the year before that, and 25 the year before that.
The 28-year-old has obvious talent, but consistency and injuries have hampered his development.
Ultimately, the Flyers will be depending on both goalies equally to stay fit and on top of their game, because the alternative is the inexperienced Aleksei Kolosov if anything goes awry.
No. 1: Matvei Michkov
Indirectly related to the power play struggles mentioned above, the Flyers need Matvei Michkov, and perhaps more than they would publicly admit.
Should Flyers Sign Matvei Michkov to 8-Year Contract Before It's Too Late?Time is rapidly ticking for the Philadelphia Flyers to sign Matvei Michkov to an eight-year contract extension.Michkov, 21, was the Flyers' leading scorer after the Olympic break last season, and that directly correlated with their late-season surge into a playoff berth in Game 81.
Before that turnaround, the Flyers had that infamous 3.8% chance of making the playoffs, according to MoneyPuck.
Now, the Flyers have paraded that around because nobody believed in them, and that's fair, but it wasn't because everybody hates the Flyers. It was because the Flyers were legitimately that mediocre at that point in time, and they didn't come back to life until Michkov and a few other players got on their horse for the last three months of the season.
Michkov still finished a "bad" season with 20 goals, 31 assists, and 51 points in 81 games, scoring four fewer power play goals and five fewer power play points than he did in his rookie season.
A summer filled with vigorous training, a clear outline of where he needs to improve physically, and a second full season of development and adjustment under his belt should put the Russian phenom in pole position to make Year 3 his best yet. It'll be up to him and the coaching staff to ultimately work this one out.
And the Flyers need it, too, because without Michkov, their offense looks even more toothless.