The Philadelphia Flyers made their first sizeable move of the 2024-25 season. A trade that had the team move on from two homegrown forwards who could still certainly be something, but they can’t actualize that talent in Philadelphia. By sending Joel Farabee and Morgan Frost to the Calgary Flames Thursday night, the Flyers are entering a significant phase of transition into what this roster looks like as soon as next season.
One of the players in the trade that is making his way to the Flyers is 28-year-old winger Andrei Kuzmenko. A player who came to the NHL as a free agent from the KHL, signed with the Vancouver Canucks, exploded in his rookie season with 39 goals, and has quietly settled into being not-so-good on a Flames team that is mediocre.
Kuzmenko is going to be an unrestricted free agent this summer and who knows if he is even staying in North America. So the Flyers have this player for the final 29 games of the season and will probably just try and see if they can crack something out of him.
After all, while he has shown that he can be a top-end scorer in the NHL, Kuzmenko has four goals in 37 games this season so we’re not talking about someone who holds immense value around the league. But if given the right opportunity and based on what we have seen in his past 190 NHL games, what can Kuzmenko really bring to this Flyers team right now?
The potential of a finisher
As mentioned before, Kuzmenko has done it before. With 39 goals back in the 2022-23 season, the winger was thought to be this incredibly signing and an expert job from Canucks scouts. Well, it turns out that he might have just been on a bender. Kuzmenko’s 27.3 shooting percentage in that fantastic rookie year led the entire NHL. And even in his following campaign, split between Calgary and Vancouver, where he scored 22 goals, he had an 18.2 shooting percentage. Remarkably high.
But was it just a lucky streak or is this an actually earned percentage? Do pucks just go in easier for Kuzmenko than most?
Well, looking at where he has shot the puck from through his three NHL seasons at 5-on-5, and it is fairly obvious how he is getting his goals.
Kuzmenko loves the front of the net. In the chart above of his unblocked shot attempts through the last three seasons, the vast majority of his shots come within mere feet of the crease. This isn’t a perimeter player, who will burst up and down the wing and just cycle around the outside, waiting for some perfect pass or to shoot the puck from 30 feet away. The staunch 5-foot-11, 194-pound winger works his way to the front of the net and delivers.
In one of his four goals from this season, Kuzmenko doesn’t necessarily power his way to the net, but he swift enough with his hands and feet to notice a wraparound opportunity with a blown defensive coverage.
Andrei Kuzmenko – Calgary Flames (4) pic.twitter.com/z1EGNRCLOB
— NHL Goal Videos (@NHLGoalVideos) January 26, 2025
While we can’t say that we have been burning the midnight oil watching the Canucks and Flames play every single game, the general impression is that Kuzmenko has shown flashes of in-tight skill better than any current Flyer not named Matvei Michkov. He can find open ice in high-danger areas to pot in an easy goal, and that is something — just being able to get the greasy goals — that has been sorely lacking from this Flyers team this season. It feels like every single goal, the Flyers need to work tirelessly for in almost every single game. Maybe Kuzmenko is able to provide a little bit of a pause to that effort.
A power play threat
A big thing for this Flyers season has been the power play. While they have improved, going from a historically terrible man advantage to being just 28th in the league in power play percentage, is not some world-shattering development. While Kuzmenko was on the Canucks, they had a top-10 power play in the league. This season with the Flames, they are bang-average at 17th in terms of converting on the man advantage.
So, can Kuzmenko really make a difference for the final months of the Flyers season? Well, if you thought he goes to the front of the net to get some chances at 5-on-5, it’s at a whole different level while on the power play.
Through the last three seasons, Kuzmenko has been the net-front guy whenever he has been on a power play unit. He has the hands to weave the puck around defender’s legs and quickly pot it over the opposing goaltender’s shoulder. Will the Flyers give him the same opportunity to do this on the top unit? Well, it’s not like they’re finding any success and any player other than Travis Konecny is really deserving a guaranteed spot on power play.
Twenty-five of Kuzmenko’s 65 career goals has come on the power play. Can he bring a little bit of that juice to Philadelphia? Please, Andrei.
Doesn’t hurt the team defensively
Now maybe the top concern about bringing in a goal-scoring winger that appears to be ultra-streaky and not well known for his efforts on the ice beyond around the net, is it affecting the team’s overall defense. While we have yet to see how he can assimilate to the Flyers current defensive scheme of clogging up the neutral zone and the center of the offensive zone to a painstakingly annoying amount for the opposition, Kuzmenko has shown in the past that he’s not some defensive liability.
This season, Kuzmenko’s on-ice expected goals against rate of 2.38 xGA/60 is the third-lowest among all Flames forwards. When he was lighting the world on fire in Vancouver during his rookie year, he had an on-ice expected goals against rate of 2.43 xGA/60 at 5-on-5, which placed him fourth-lowest on that team among all skaters and was the best at preventing expected goals among all Canucks forwards who played over 15 games that season.
We’re not saying that he’s going to suddenly be a Russian Mark Stone for the Flyers, but he isn’t some slouch that has been absolutely brutal defensively in overall on-ice effects. His deployment has been a tad favorable this season with the Flames — a 45.69 offensive zone faceoff percentage is the most among regular skaters and is similar deployment to what Tortorella gave Morgan Frost this season — so that can lead to an inflated on-ice expected goals effect. But again, he hasn’t specifically shown to be a total liability when it comes down to the numbers.
If it doesn’t work out, someone to sell at the trade deadline
By some chance that the Flyers absolutely loathe Kuzmenko and what he brings to the Flyers, they will have a chance to retain some of his $5.5-million cap hit and could gladly take a mid-round pick back for the hypothetical rental. Maybe they will along the way boost some of his value by playing him a crapload on the power play, next to a familiar face in Michkov, and just giving him every chance to score possible, but even if not, they can move on if they want to.
If it’s a disaster, then, well, Kuzmenko can bring some entertainment to the final third of a Flyers season that could’ve been miserable to follow.
