How do the Flyers compare to recent Stanley Cup champions?

Unlike the other professional sports leagues, the NHL has yet to undergo an efficiency revolution. There is no one way to build a team in terms or composition, style of play or concentration of talent. Without a guiding force like baseball’s three true outcomes, basketball’s corner threes and football’s explosive offense, hockey general maangers are largely left to their own devices to implement a vision.

In the 2010s there was a prevailing sentiment as whatever team LeBron James was on, or the Golden State Warriors traded titles for the decade that the NBA was a superteam driven league. That if you didn’t have at least two perennial All-NBA caliber players, there was no point in playing out the season.

No one told the NHL that because over the last 15 years, the NHL has fewer unique champions than the NBA. That’s right, between the Chicago Blackhawks (3), Los Angeles Kings (2), Pittsburgh Penguins (2), Tampa Bay Lightning (2) and Florida Panthers (2) hockey, the ultimate team sport is more star driven than the NBA.

That makes acquiring stars the single biggest imperative to contending for a Stanley Cup. Setting the benchmarks for what contender status looks like is an ever-moving target year over year as the league evolves. But one thing remains true, you need as much cost controlled high-end talent as you can compile to compete at the highest level.

When it comes to the Philadelphia Flyers in year three under Danny Briere, one thing remains clear: The team has a long way to go to look like a contender.

The Stakeholders

The value of an NHL coach is pretty limited in comparison to the other major North American sports. As an execution, not tactics sport, hockey coaches are left at the mercy of the players at their disposal. A strong coach might be able to squeeze slightly more out of a group, but for the most part, there isn’t a clearcut prevailing philosophy within the NHL that correlates with success.

Amongst the last 15 Stanley Cup champion winning teams a few patterns emerge.

Number one and most significantly, Stanley Cup winning teams are led most often by those who’ve coached before. While the insularity of the NHL coaching carousel is undoubtedly frustrating and a driving force in the trend, retread coaches have won the lion’s share of cups since 2010. Just two coaches, Jon Cooper and Jared Bednar, were first time bench bosses when they won their respective championships.

In addition, as the NHL coach turnover rate increases, we are seeing the tenure of coaches that win championships get shorter. The average coach was behind the bench for three and a half seasons when their team won the Stanley Cup. That lines up with the fact that the average NHL coaching tenure is only 2.3 years long, the shortest of the four North American sports leagues.

It’s not just behind the bench either, the average general manager of a Cup winner being on the job 3.6 years. Big picture, this means leadership groups are getting shorter than ever opportunities to build out their visions. With owners having the macro evidence of both coaches and general managers winning championships in short windows, they have justification for the frantic environment.

This also points to executives and coaches likely being finishing touches on teams that have largely done the heavy lifting already. The idea of a caretaker manager exists in soccer, someone who knows they won’t be around long enough to reap the benefits of their work, but an integral component of developing a team in the long-term.

When it comes to the Danny Briere and Rick Tocchet combo, they are seemingly in strong standing with Flyers’ ownership. But, Briere is coming up on that benchmark 3.6 years on the job and fast. Tocchet in year one has time, but he’s inherently connected to Briere’s timeline. A new general manager would want their own guy, regardless of what Tocchet may or may not have achieved.

The Physical Makeup

Getting back to the initial premise of there being no one way to win, the data is relatively consistent when it comes to physical size. Now, as the league at large gets more homogenous as skillsets blend together to optimize for the environment it makes sense that players would largely have similar physiques.

Within any large cohort, players will typically fall along the lines of a normal distribution. The average NHL player this season is 6-foot-1 and weighs 201 pounds. Therefore, it’s unsurprising that the last five Stanley Cup champions, dating back to 2021 all fall into similar boxes.

The average Cup winner checked in at 6-foot-1 and a weight of 199 pounds. So not a whole lot to glean there. That said, it is notable that for all of the gushing over the Florida Panthers physical play, their average team weight last season was 196 pounds, the lightest over the last five years.

In comparison, the Flyers do check in at 196 pounds this season. At face value, I’d have said that was a byproduct of being such a young team that a contingent of their group still had physical maturing to do and mass to put on. The curve of size from 18-22 is already big for men, then think about the jump of going from junior, college or European league hockey to an NHL team with a professional strength and conditioning as well as nutrition programs spurs growth.

How the Sausage is Made

The conventional wisdom in hockey is to tank, draft high and waltz your way to Stanley Cups on the back of superstar talent. With player mobility restricted until they reach 27 years old, there are tens of thousands of players who’ve played games in the NHL without ever reaching unrestricted free agency. With star players at such a premium, teams are going to capitalize on their value as best they can instead of losing them for nothing.

In just the last handful of years, Matthew Tkachuk and Quinn Hughes, two of the 15 best players in the league this decade were traded for massive hauls. That’s why on top of drafting well, it’s important to stockpile assets when not trying to actively compete. Then, once your team is ready to contend for cups, you have to embrace the Vegas Golden Knights’ mentality of being all-in all the time.

Despite conventional wisdom about the merits of building through the draft, that requires further depth. Overall, of the last five Stanley Cup champions, 68 percent of those rosters were acquired through trades or free agency. The addendum to the importance of the draft needs to be tied to high-end talent. With so little of it to go around and stars concentrated on a handful of teams, depth is always going to be available.

With the Golden Knights, as an expansion team the obvious outlier, the teams of the 2020s are built with stars through the draft. Tampa Bay and Colorado are headlined by a small army of future Hall of Famers. Florida had a strong foundation with Alex Barkov and Aaron Ekblad before going out swinging for Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Reinhart.

Most of all, it should only reaffirm the notion that while depth is important, stars are what win in the NHL.

The Flyers at present are 44.8% drafted players which tracks with an organization rebuilding. In the mean time it’s of the utmost importance that the Flyers give their young players ample playing time to make informed decisions. The more action their pieces get, the better situated they\'ll be to supplement them with high-end talent when the opportunity strikes.

On the Roster

There are times where making the playoffs over and over again without any real hope of advancing is Sisyphian. No matter what, you know the path ahead of you isn’t going to break your way. The team simply isn’t good enough. The Los Angeles Kings have had some solid seasons the last handful of years. None of those teams could beat the Edmonton Oilers regardless of the tweaks around the edges.

That said, there is so much value in experience when it comes to players. It might be a chicken or egg situation where the better a player is, the more experience they’ve cultivated or experience makes them into better players, but the proof is in the pudding. To eventually win a Stanley Cup, a team needs to be in the playoffs, consistently.

The Lightning drafted Steven Stamkos in 2009 and didn’t win a cup until 2020. The Panthers drafted Barkov in 2013 and they didn’t win until 2024. The Avalanche took Nathan MacKinnon in 2014 and didn’t win until 2022. Meaning that your organization needs to be in the mix for the long haul. You’ll go through multiple iterations of supporting cast, coach and general manager before breaking through.

When it comes to the Flyers, they\'re in the earliest stages of their window. Going into Wednesday\'s game against the Utah Mammoth, they had a combined 7,534 regular season games played. Their roster has a total of 163 combined playoff games under their belt.

In comparison the average of the last five Stanley Cup winners had a total of 9216 regular season games and 966 playoff games. Now, experience isn\'t everything and talent can overcome that rawness. But, based on the roster the Flyers have at present, it\'s still too early on in their life cycle to make any final conclusions about their core.

The Talent Question

It\'s a reasonable reaction to get defensive over prospects. The Flyers have a small army of prospects ranging from teenagers to those in their mid-20s. With so much volume, it\'s only natural that not every player is going to make it. That\'s just a simple matter of fact when it comes down to the nature of drafting. There are hundreds if not thousands of variables that go into the development of a player and the capacity to reach their full potential.

Since Flyers have so many players in the nascent stages of their careers, it\'s only natural that the group at large still needs time. At this point, Philadelphia\'s top priority needs to be high-end talent acquisition. It\'s done an admirable job assembling a reasonably competitive group and based on the weakness of the Eastern Conference at large, very much can hang around in the mix for a playoff birth.

In spite of the playoffs being a plausible goal this year, until the Flyers iron out who the key pieces on their next contender are, they\'ll be stuck in wild card purgatory. The last time a team from one of the two wild card spots or the 7/8 seed in the old 1-8 format won the Stanley Cup was the 2011-2012 Kings. Trying to be the once in a 15-year period team is not nearly good enough odds to divert from the current course.

The Flyers still have quite a ways to go when it comes to accruing the value needed to win a Stanley Cup. While WAR is only one metric, it\'s a good snapshot way to measure the differences in value between players and teams at large. When you take every player on each of the last five Stanley Cup winners\' average WAR in a season and add them up, the Flyers are nine wins above replacement below their average.

For context, a Hart Trophy caliber season is usually worth about 4 WAR. Now, the Flyers don\'t need to make up that gap with just one or two players. At the moment the Flyers are icing several players who have 0.1 as their career WAR with how little hockey they\'ve played. There\'s still time for the in-house pieces to make up some of that gap.

Yet, until the Flyers unlock two or three star level skaters, they\'re going to have a very defined ceiling. Amongst the group Philadelphia has now, the supporting cast of a contender is coming into focus. There are enough middle six forwards and capable defensemen to start wish casting a big trade into existence.

Those big trades are increasingly becoming a defining characteristic of contemporary NHL contenders. Now, it\'s imperative the Flyers keep their eye on the ball. Time is both a blessing and a curse when it comes to rebuilds. The clock is always ticking, which in the early stages means opportunities to improve the situation with little pressure. Yet, the longer it takes for a rebuild to get off the ground, the less likely it ever gets there under the current leadership.

Talking Points