Two days after making a trade that certainly shook up the Flyers locker room, GM Danny Briere addressed the media to explain more of the thought process behind the trade. 

Moving two still relatively young pieces like Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee, 25 and 24 respectively, certainly seems to put an emphasis on the future. Briere confirmed that thinking on Saturday.

“Really this was a move for the future,” Briere said. “Not so much about this year the way I look at it.

“For us it’s not giving up on the season. [Andrei] Kuzmenko has proven to be a game breaker before. If there is some chemistry there, who knows what happens. Giving [Jakob] Pelletier also the chance to play we will see what he has. He's spunky and maybe he brings a spark. A lot has got to depend on the chemistry that is being built, and it's going to have to be done quickly. Obviously, Joel’s impact lately, it's no secret that it was a tough year. He was struggling. Morgan has also had an up and down season. If those two guys come in and somehow find some chemistry and are able to help us. Who knows what could happen. It's not giving up on the season.”

While the Flyers may not be giving up on the season, the writing was starting to appear on the wall. They are six points out of a playoff spot after Saturday night. They have just 29 games left in the regular season to not only make up the margin, but pass five other teams ahead of them outside of the playoff picture.

Add in that in moving Frost, the Flyers become thinner at center in the here and now, and it’s highly unlikely they will make up that margin.

So what is the future benefit for the Flyers from this trade? They bring in a 28-year-old Russian forward who can work with Matvei Michkov and get an early look at a UFA to see if there’s something there that works. They get a 23-year-old just scratching the surface on his NHL career to see how he fits in this process. They add another second-round pick in this year’s draft, now giving them seven picks in the first two rounds. And most of all, they got Farabee’s contract off the books and will have more cap flexibility as a result.

“The biggest thing in all of this is the cap flexibility that it gives us moving forward,” Briere said. “Maybe not this year per se but moving forward. It's no secret that, especially in Joel's case, the cap hit moving forward was tough. Most of the discussions we had, teams were not willing to take on his full salary. Especially with the term left on it. Morgan was also getting closer to getting paid a lot more money.

“It goes back to the players and the development of the players around them. I think within the Flyers organization where there are a lot more prospects coming in, we have some young guys developing, and we felt that around them, guys were going by them. We had higher hopes, I would say, for Morgan and Joel just maybe two years ago. Some guys were starting to go by them.”

Briere specifically noted Owen Tippett, Tyson Foerster, Bobby Brink, and Noah Cates as players who have taken a step, and essentially implied that Frost and Farabee hadn’t taken the steps they wanted to see.

So does this cap flexibility mean something big could be on the horizon for the Flyers, and sooner than expected perhaps in the free-agent market?

“It gives us some possibilities going into the offseason,” Briere said. “It is like cracking open the door a little bit. I wouldn't say that it's wide open. I'm not saying that this will be the year that we go out. It's got to be the right player or players if we do decide to open up the checkbook and go after free agents, but it does crack the door open to some possibilities. We don't know who's going to be there yet at this point. It's a little too early, but it's possible that it gives us the chance to start dipping our toes a little quicker. But time will tell.”

As for the two new Flyers, Kuzmenko and Pelletier, there are spots of intrigue for Briere that they want to evaluate.

“For Kuzmenko, we get to see what he is,” Briere said. “He had a really good year two years ago. Last year, he had a rough start, but really came on in the second half. This year, again, he had a little bit of a slow start, but he was coming on lately. So it gives us the chance to see a little bit of him from here on out. We will see if he can boost our offense a little bit coming down the stretch. 

“Then in Pelletier, he's a former first round pick. He is someone that hasn't really had the chance to kind of put it together in Calgary. We're hoping that a fresh start for him gets him going. We like the motor. We like his energy and his spunk. He also has some offense in his background. We'll see what he can do, but we're excited about him and he's only 23 years old.”

Flyers fans may have to wait a bit for the debut of Kuzmenko and Pelletier in orange and black. Due to visa issues, they are not expected to play on Sunday in Colorado and the Flyers are hopeful to have them in the lineup on Tuesday in Utah.

But the overarching theme of the trade was about the future, about adding yet another draft pick and more cap flexibility to potentially do something bigger in the offseason. It adds to the critical nature of this offseason and supplies a new wrinkle. Adding one more pick to go from six to seven in the first two rounds is only a small bonus, another chip added to the stack at the table. 

But the cap space, that could come into play a lot sooner than expected. It could just provide the next cornerstone piece for the Flyers if they can find the right player to help lead them out of this rebuild.

Kevin Durso is Flyers insider for 97.3 ESPN. Follow him on social media @Kevin_Durso.

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