Jamie Drysdale has emerged as an important piece of the Philadelphia Flyers.
The bar was set high when he was acquired in the Cutter Gauthier trade in January 2024, and after a year and a half in Philadelphia, Drysdale had a bit of a breakout campaign last year.
Drysdale scored a career-high eight goals and tied a career-high with 32 points in 78 games last season. That production and his defensive development helped him earn a four-year, $26 million contract extension this summer.
The Flyers defenseman joined the What Chaos podcast on Wednesday and spoke about settling into Philadelphia, his friendship with Trevor Zegras, playing for Rick Tocchet and John Tortorella, and the growth of the game thanks to shows like Heated Rivalry and Off Campus.
Drysdale’s ‘switch in the mindset’ in Philadelphia
“My first two years were pretty good, and then I took a little injury hiatus, I guess you could call it, for the following two. And then it just got to a point where you just say, screw it. No one’s going to fix this but me.”
The defenseman debuted as an 18-year-old in the 2021 season. He played 24 games that year, and got in a full 81 games the next season. However, he played just eight games in the 2022-23 season and 34 the year he was traded: 10 with the Ducks and 24 with the Flyers.
“Sure, I was hurt for the better part of two years, but the skills didn’t go away. The ability didn’t go away,” he continued. “Maybe just a switch in the mindset. Not fully believing, and then once you switch that, it’s just right back on track.”
Drysdale gained confidence during his first season with the Flyers, and saw his average ice time go up by over 90 seconds last season as he played 21:33 per game.
He mentioned that staying away from social media has helped him mentally, and the guys brought up a Drysdale hockey card that did him dirty.
“Some of the photos on the cards are just like oof. Out of all the photos over however many years, this is the one you guys go with? I’m like, damn. I can’t complain; I’m on a hockey card. Younger me would be thrilled and surprised. I can’t complain, but maybe pick some better photos,” he said. “It’s definitely, woof, not my finest hour. And that’s what’s going out in a lot of numbers. It’s all good, though.”
Michkov supported by Drysdale, Flyers teammates
The hosts used that as an opportunity to transition to a question about Matvei Michkov, specifically regarding the reports that he came into training camp out of shape.
“This is obviously not body shaming or anything; you are a world-class athlete, and we don’t body shame anyway, but I did want to ask in the sake of being a good teammate, if any of you have considered showing up to camp out of shape so Tocchet can go easier on Michkov this year?” they questioned.
Drysdale laughed and took a beat — eight seconds to be exact — before responding.
“You know what, he did a great job. He was working his tail off to get back,” he said. “At the end of the day, it’s everyone’s responsibility to show up into camp. You’ve got the summer to work out and train. I expect everyone to come in flying in training camp. It’ll be a real exciting year for us.”
Drysdale noted that hockey players are under a microscope, so things get blown out of proportion, and that comes with the territory.
“I think at the end of the day, all the guys in the locker room know what’s up, know the character behind everyone. You just got to be there for your teammates,” he said. “It could literally be anything. Camp, trade noise, anything. There’s so much stuff out there all the time. That’s the one thing you have is each other in the locker room. You just push away everything, all the negativity outside of it.”
Briere called Drysdale after Zegras trade
Having a few close friends in the locker room can help with that, and Drysdale got another one when the Flyers traded for Trevor Zegras last summer. It was a move that reunited two former Ducks, and Danny Briere made sure to let Drysdale know about the acquisition.
“He called me; he was like, ‘Hey, you see what I just did?’ and I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m freaking pumped,'” Drysdale recalled. “I knew we got a good one in Z. Heck of a guy. Heck of a locker room guy, and obviously what he does on the ice speaks for itself. That was definitely funny. I was like, ‘Why is he calling me?’ and then he told me that. It was pretty electric.”
The two had a close friendship in Anaheim, but Drysdale tried to play down the bromance.
“I was just there. Z was the main character for the whole time,” he said. “I would just sit there, smile, and laugh at all the interesting remarks and stuff that he would do.”
While Drysdale and Zegras, or even Drysdale and York, get a lot of the attention, the defenseman acknowledged that there are a lot of close friendships in the locker room. He specifically mentioned Travis Konecny and Travis Sanheim — two of the team’s veteran leaders — and Tyson Foerster and Bobby Brink as two close duos.
“I’ve just been fortunate to play with a lot of good dudes,” he said. “I consider myself lucky.”
Briere showed ‘big kahunas’ with Carlsson offer sheet
Of course, the headline of the Flyers’ offseason, and perhaps one of the headlines across the NHL, was the Leo Carlsson offer sheet.
Drysdale explained that he and the rest of the players were in the same boat as the fans and media as the hockey world waited out the week of purgatory.
“Honestly, it was probably similar for us as it was for everyone else. We don’t exactly have insider information. We’re just at home like everyone else. We found out like everyone else. We found out when it matched like everyone else.
“I think I was probably the last person to see when it went down. My buddy texted into our group chat just with my home friends that the offer sheet was made. I was also at the gym when I found out it got matched, so I was a few hours late on that. Crazy. Definitely crazy. It was wild seeing that, but you like to see a big move like that.”
It was a big swing by Briere that has put the league on notice, and it has an impact on the locker room as well.
“In the moment, you’re like ‘Holy crap.’ That’s the only thing that goes through your mind,” he said .”I feel like these days, it’s real tough to find a number one center. He took a swing. That shows big kahunas. You’ve got to respect it. I think they’ve done a great job. I think we got a high-caliber team. It would’ve been a nice addition, obviously; no one’s going to argue that one, but again, we’re excited for this year as the group we have.”
The Flyers surprised a lot of people last season, famously going from a 3.8% chance of making the playoffs to winning a round against the Penguins. Drysdale thinks the Philadelphia roster is being overlooked once again.
“There’s a lot of high-caliber players around the league, and I think we’ve got an underrated lineup as well,” he opined. “I’m excited to go into this year and see what we can do.”
Drysdale on playing for Tocchet vs. Tortorella
They’ll be looking to build on last year’s performance as they head into the second season with Tocchet behind the bench. The coach’s “F*ck everybody” speech in the locker room made waves around the league.
We’re in the ballgame, boys. pic.twitter.com/ppMaLzc4J4
— Philadelphia Flyers (@NHLFlyers) March 30, 2026
“Electric. He’s great. He’s totally one of the guys. Coach first when he needs to be. It’s always nice to have a good motivator, someone who’s been through it. He was great,” Drysdale said. “The first year, it was awesome. I think we’re only going to go up from there.”
That speech came a little more than a year after the Flyers fired John Tortorella, who said that he had no interest in learning how to coach a rebuilding team prior to getting canned.
Drysdale was asked about how it felt to hear that and the aftermath.
“I mean, yeah, obviously not ideal. Everyone would take it a similar way. In saying that, I don’t think us as a group were where we wanted to be in that moment. It kind of sucked for everybody,” he recalled. “He said what he said, and it’s not ideal to hear. There’s no secret there. In saying that, I think everyone had higher expectations, and we weren’t where we wanted to be.”
It was likely an especially interesting time for Drysdale as it was one of his close friends in York who had an altercation with Tortorella earlier that week.
That’s all water under the bridge now, though, as the Flyers are once again headed in the right direction.
Heated Rivalry is ‘great for the game’
Hopefully, too, is the state of hockey thanks to a few shows that took the world by storm. Of course, we’re talking about Heated Rivalry.
“My girlfriend watched it and pretty much filled me in on every single episode, so I feel like I’ve watched everything. And then she had me watch Off Campus as well, the new hockey show,” Drysdale said. “I know on our team that was a similar story across the board in terms of just hearing back from it. It’s pretty awesome to see hockey shows coming out and being this successful. It’s great for the game, and I think it brings a lot more attention.”
The Flyers will have a lot more attention on them this season as well after making the playoffs for the first time since 2020 last season. They’re turning the corner on the rebuild, and Drysdale can play a big part in that.
