NHL Trade Rumors: Flyers Generating Lots of Interest Around NHL

Despite starting the season on what has now devolved into an eight-game losing streak (0-5-3), the Philadelphia Flyers are still generating plenty of trade interest around the NHL.

Which teams are inquiring, you may ask? Or would even want to inquire? That's less clear, though any team calling Flyers general manager Danny Briere's phone is looking to buy low on one of many struggling players.

In TSN's latest "Insider Trading" segment, NHL insider Pierre LeBrun reported that Briere is indeed getting tons of calls from around the league, and that's not necessarily a good thing amid the team's 0-5-3 start that has seen them allow the most shots per game, generate the fewest shots per game, and score the fewest goals per game.

"Danny Briere, the GM of the Flyers, my understanding is his phone is getting all kinds of love from other GMs around the league, but not the kind of attention you wanna get," said LeBrun.

"There is no easy fix here. There is no blockbuster trade that the Flyers are gonna pull off to get themselves out of this brutal start. I know some fans are chanting, 'Fire Rick Tocchet.' That’s not even a thought for Flyers management right now. The answer lies within.

"This is a collective letdown from the start of the year. There’s a belief inside that management group that this is a group of young players who, after getting a taste of success last year, maybe took a lot for granted here entering this year. It’s a wake-up call. They gotta fix it themselves."

The pressure on Flyers head coach Rick Tocchet continues to build as Philadelphia extends its worst season-opening slide in franchise history, but LeBrun insists, further to previous reporting from Anthony Di Marco, a coaching change is not something that's in Briere and Co.'s playbook at this moment in time.

As for a potential trade, the Flyers have been linked to Detroit's Simon Edvinsson and Dylan Larkin, though Larkin doesn't want to come to Philly, and Detroit is hellbent on keeping and re-signing Edvinsson, an RFA still without a contract well into the start of the season.

Maybe Flyers president Keith Jones did some scouting at Monday night's Devils-Senators game in Newark, but the Flyers would have to present a viable deal to make the playoff hopefuls even consider striking a trade.

With the amount of big contracts and trade protection the Flyers have given out recently, it is hard to even pinpoint the players they could sell off to inquiring teams, though it is safe to assume that players like Rasmus Ristolainen, Noah Cates, Owen Tippett, Cam York, and even Matvei Michkov would generate interest from prospective contenders.

With a terribly difficult slate of games coming up for the Flyers - one that includes games against Ottawa, Colorado, Buffalo, Anaheim, and Washington - this situation could be one to monitor closely, especially if the Flyers are unable to begin making up some serious ground in the standings.