The Flyers made their point with the Leo Carlsson offer sheet, and the ripple effect is still shaking up the RFA market.
What Danny Briere and the front office tried with Carlsson was bold enough to turn heads across the league: a 5-year, $18 million-per-year deal for a player who still had plenty left to prove. It would have made him the highest-paid player in the NHL, at least for the coming season. Anaheim matched, but the message was sent.
Since then, the market has kept climbing. Connor Bedard signed a 5-year deal at $15 million annually to stay with the Chicago Blackhawks, while the San Jose Sharks locked up Macklin Celebrini on a 5-year extension worth $18.8 million per year, a deal that will make him the highest-paid player in the league starting in 2027-28.
That leaves the Flyers in a fascinating spot. They already took their big swing.
They also still have a glaring need at the top of the lineup, with no true No. 1 center in place. And now Adam Fantilli is sitting there as one of the few notable RFAs still unsigned.
Fantilli, 21, is eligible for an offer sheet, and according to Elliotte Friedman, he and Columbus remain apart in negotiations with training camp a little over a month away. Friedman said the gap may come down to money, with Fantilli potentially looking for a deal in the Carlsson or Bedard neighborhood while the Blue Jackets may be closer to the $12 million to $12.5 million range.
On paper, Fantilli checks a lot of Flyers boxes. He’s 6-foot-2, plays with a physical edge, and brings the kind of tenacity Philadelphia has seemed to value.
He also has real offensive upside and a knack for creating chances in the attacking zone. If everything clicks, he has the tools to grow into a legitimate top-line center for a long time.
The production is moving in the right direction, too. Fantilli posted a career-best 59 points in 2025-26, including 35 assists and 24 goals.
That goal total was seven shy of his career high of 31, which he reached in his second professional season. It wasn’t the kind of leap Celebrini made, but it still reinforced the idea that Fantilli is on a promising track.
There are concerns, though. His faceoff numbers have been an issue, as reflected by a career 45.4% mark at the dot, even if he improved to 49.8% in 2025-26.
His defensive play has also been inconsistent. That’s where the gamble starts to matter.
Anthony Di Marco of the Daily Faceoff reported that the Flyers are unlikely to go after Fantilli with an offer sheet, saying the front office wants to keep its financial flexibility for a move that fits the bigger picture.
And that’s really the debate here: do the Flyers chase the center they need right now, or keep their powder dry for a bigger move later?
If Columbus is truly sitting in the $12 million to $12.5 million range, Philly would likely need to go closer to $14 million annually just to have a shot. The contract would also need enough term to make it unattractive for the Blue Jackets while still being worth the draft-pick cost for the Flyers.
That compensation is no small thing. Fantilli would land in the highest offer-sheet bracket, meaning the Flyers would owe four first-round picks.
They already have the Toronto Maple Leafs’ first-rounder in either 2027 or 2028, and there are players on the roster who could help replenish picks now or at the deadline. In theory, Philly could make a move that big and still end up with three first-rounders in the next four drafts.
Cap space isn’t the immediate problem. The Flyers currently have $13,782,083 available for the coming season.
They project to have $27,382,083 next summer, with Matvei Michkov really the only major piece needing a new deal. The number jumps to $51,525,000 in the following summer, though Porter Martone, Alex Bump, and Denver Barkey would need contracts by then, and the roster still would need a lot more work.
Right now, only 11 players are under contract for the 2028-29 season.
But Fantilli would change all of that fast. He would leave the Flyers with almost no current space, slash the 2027-28 flexibility in half, and reduce the 2028-29 cap projection to about $37 million.
That’s the exact kind of squeeze Di Marco was pointing to.
Carlsson looked like the safer bet to become a true top center. Fantilli still has more to prove, even if he would immediately become the Flyers’ No. 1 down the middle. That’s why this feels less like a question of talent and more like one of timing.
And on timing, the safer play may be to wait. The Flyers need a center, no doubt. But signing a player simply because he fills the biggest hole can box you into a corner later.
In Other News...
Danny Briere Is Driving The Flyers Back Into The Fight
By the time the Flyers got back into the playoffs in 2025-26, the shift around the franchise was already hard to miss. Philadelphia finished third in the Metropolitan Division, got past Pittsburgh in the first round and reminded the league that this team is no longer content to sit on the outside looking in. A big part of that turnaround traces back to Danny Briere, the former Flyers player long remembered as Mr. Playoffs, who now has the front office job of steering the club back into relevance.
Briere has been more than a symbolic figurehead, too. His roster-building has shown real intent, especially with the 2025 acquisition of Trevor Zegras, a move aimed at giving the Flyers more skill and pace in the lineup. The results have already pushed Philadelphia back into the fight, even if the run ended in the second round against Carolina, and the next question is how far Briere can keep pressing this rebuild before it turns into something even more lasting. [Read more 🡒]
Flyers May Have A New Answer To Their Center Problem
The Flyers search for help down the middle took a real swing when they put a five-year, $90 million offer sheet on Ducks center Leo Carlsson, only to see Anaheim match it. It was the kind of aggressive move that signaled how badly Philadelphia wants to solve its center situation, but with that route closed for now, the front office may spend the rest of this offseason waiting for a better opening instead of forcing another major addition.
One name already being floated for a future chase is Ottawa forward Drake Batherson, who Jeff Marek said on The Sheet podcast is expected to reach free agency in 2027. For the Flyers, that gives them another possible target to monitor if they are still looking for more offense and more stability at center by then, especially if they decide to save their big swing for next summer rather than rush into another move before then. [Read more 🡒]
Flyers Fans Can Already See The Debate Around This Scoring Gamble
Patrik Laine is back in the conversation, and this time the circle of interested teams appears wider than it first looked. Reports now have several clubs poking around the winger for the 2026-27 season, a notable shift from the earlier chatter that centered mostly on the Islanders and their offer of only a professional tryout agreement.
For Flyers fans, the appeal is easy to understand and the debate is just as easy to picture. Laine still carries the kind of scoring upside that can change the mood around an offense, but his injury history also makes him the sort of player teams have to approach carefully. Philadelphia is one of the clubs weighing whether that upside is worth the risk, and the conversation around him is already starting to feel like one of those front-office calls that can split a fan base before anything is even finalized. [Read more 🡒]