The Flyers are showing signs of real interest.
In a surprising twist, the Philadelphia Flyers have reportedly turned to the Edmonton Oilers in search of big upgrades to their group of defensemen going forward.
Veteran Nick Seeler is beginning to show signs of wear and tear as he gets older, and pending RFA Emil Andrae is looking increasingly likely to be on another NHL team next season.
That leaves the Flyers in need of another left-shot defenseman, and a solid one with experience, too, after they just made the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time in six years.
One player with such experience is Edmonton Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse, who helped guide the Western Conference titans to back-to-back appearances in the Stanley Cup Final.
Nurse, 31, has four seasons remaining on his contract at a $9.25 million cap hit, which is the major detractor when it comes to both trading him and trading for him.
According to On Pattison's Anthony San Filippo, though, the Flyers could be one of the approved destinations for the Oilers defenseman, who has a full no-move clause, and the Flyers have interest if the price is reasonable.
"A source outside of the Flyers organization said Nurse, who has a full no-trade clause in his contract through the end of next season, has told the Oilers there are a few teams he is willing to be traded to right now. Are the Flyers one of them? It’s unclear, but a separate source told me they would be an approved destination," San Filippo reported.
Logistically, the Flyers could very easily absorb Nurse's full cap hit without much trouble going forward, but that would also be money spent that they could allocate elsewhere.
RFAs Trevor Zegras and Jamie Drysdale need new contracts, Matvei Michkov is eligible for an extension as of July 1, Dan Vladar will sign an extension this summer, and maybe the Flyers sign John Carlson in free agency, too.
Nurse wouldn't stop any of those things from happening, but it would make for an unnecessarily tight ship if an opportunity arose for the Flyers to add, say, a No. 1 center or player-adjacent.
“That’s the difficult part of the conversation,” a Flyers source told San Filippo, saying that there has been internal discussion about how it would have to look for them to be interested enough to pick up the phone. “It depends on what the cost is for them to retain, and how much they would be retaining.”
Nurse is an overall better, more versatile player than someone like Rasmus Ristolainen, who currently carries a $5.1 million cap hit.
So, to make Nurse's contract palatable, the Flyers would have to get his number down to somewhere between that and $7 million.
Salary retention costs a lot these days, and it's a risky move for a contender like Edmonton to pay players to play on another team, but they have little choice with the primes of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl winding down.
As for any potential trade compensation, it is worth noting that the Flyers do not have fourth- or fifth-round picks in the 2026 NHL Draft, though they do have both in 2027 in addition to two third-round picks.
It's also fair to wonder if the Oilers would entertain a straight player swap with retention for someone like Andrae, potentially in addition to another bubble NHLer or useful depth player.
The Flyers have plenty of avenues to explore, and Nurse's $74 million contract is certainly one of them, even with its warts.
Now, we have evidence of some tentative interest.