At a time when the Flyers look mostly set heading into the 2026 offseason, training camp still has a way of blowing up tidy plans. Injuries happen.
Depth charts shift. Jobs that seemed spoken for suddenly open up.
That’s where a few prospects come in.
Philadelphia has already lived through one of those camp surprises before. Last year, Helge Grans went into the preseason with a real path to the No. 6 job on defense, only to struggle badly enough that Noah Juulsen wound up getting the nod instead. That kind of shake-up is very much on the table again, especially on the blue line, where Rasmus Ristolainen and newcomer Simon Benoit are both in the final year of their contracts.
One of the names to watch is Oliver Bonk. The 2023 first-round pick has started flashing NHL ability, and he made that plain with a goal and an assist in his NHL debut against Montreal on April 14.
He later got into the Stanley Cup playoffs against the Hurricanes in Game 4 on May 9, a 3-2 overtime loss. If Bonk keeps trending up, adds strength, plays faster, and stays healthy, the former 22nd overall pick should have a real shot to work himself into the roster discussion.
Last season, the battle between Juulsen and Grans was so underwhelming that Bonk may have had a legitimate opening if he had been healthy. This time, the competition is tougher, but a strong camp could still push him into a spot at the expense of someone like Ristolainen or even David Jiricek.
Hunter McDonald is another defenseman with a real chance to make noise. He remains the Flyers’ last unsigned restricted free agent, and time is ticking on his NHL runway.
McDonald, 24, also debuted against the Canadiens on April 14 and picked up his first NHL point with an assist. He finished that game with a +3 rating and, in classic McDonald fashion, four penalty minutes.
At 6-foot-4, he brings size, and by the end of next season he’ll be 25, so the push now is simple: show Philadelphia he can step into the roles currently held by Benoit and Nick Seeler. He was drafted as an overager in 2022 and has long been viewed as an internal favorite, but he’s not alone in that lane.
Ty Murchison had a solid cameo last year, and the Flyers also used a first-round pick on Maksim Sokolovskii at the 2026 NHL Draft two months ago. With Seeler getting older and no longer shielded by trade protection, and Benoit signed for only one more year, this may be McDonald’s best opportunity.
Up front, the prospect to watch is Devin Kaplan. Jett Luchanko might seem like the obvious choice, but the Flyers want him getting as many minutes as possible if he’s not one of the 12 best forwards on the roster.
Kaplan, a 6-foot-3 right wing, is the more fitting name here. He made his NHL debut late in the dreadful 2024-25 season in a 5-4 loss to Buffalo, then spent last year in his first full pro season with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms.
In 49 AHL games, he put up five goals, eight assists, and 13 points before a season-ending injury cut things short.
Now he’s heading into a contract year, and the Flyers’ crowded wing picture means he needs a big camp to stay in the mix. Leaning harder into his grinder style would help.
Philadelphia brought back Carl Grundstrom earlier this offseason on a one-year, $1 million deal, but the organization would clearly love to see another young player jump a veteran for a job, the way Nikita Grebenkin did last year and Denver Barkey and Alex Bump did later in the season. With Noel Acciari signed, the Flyers don’t need Grundstrom’s center flexibility quite as much, which gives a winger like Kaplan a little more room to break through.
They also traded Garnet Hathaway this offseason, leaving a hole on the fourth line at right wing. Kaplan has a chance to grow into that kind of role, and training camp is the place to start.
In Other News...
Flyers Trade Talk Centers On A Risky Fix For Their Blue Line
The Flyers search for help on the blue line has pushed them into the kind of trade conversations that tend to come with real cost attached. Philadelphia has been linked to Montreal in a framework built around defense help on one side and scoring depth on the other, with both clubs eyeing long-term pieces rather than short-term patches. That alone tells you how serious the fit could be, because players under contract for the long haul are not the sort of names teams casually throw into rumor season.
For the Flyers, the attraction is obvious: a young defenseman who could stabilize a thin back end for years, not just months. For the Canadiens, the appeal would be adding a forward who can help address their need for more punch up front. The complication is just as obvious, since a deal built around that kind of value would ask Philadelphia to part with one of its more important scoring wingers, which is exactly why these talks feel less like a simple upgrade and more like a risky attempt to solve one problem by creating another. [Read more 🡒]
Canadiens Search Just Sparked A Much Bigger Roster Debate
The Canadiens search for help on the right side of their blue line has already started to pull a few familiar names into the discussion, and one of the more relevant ones from a Flyers perspective is Rasmus Ristolainen. In Anthony Di Marcos read on the market, Montreal is looking at right-shot defensemen who could fit that need, which puts Ristolainen in the conversation as a player with the size and style teams still tend to covet when they go shopping for help on defense.
The broader debate, though, is that Montreals interest does not appear to stop at one type of target or one level of ambition. Di Marco also floated Brandon Carlo as another possible fit, while NHL reporter Jimmy Murphy went even bigger by suggesting the Canadiens would be well-positioned if Nathan MacKinnon ever became available. Nothing is settled, but the fact that Montreal is being linked to both blue-line options and a star of that magnitude shows how wide open the conversation around its next move has become. [Read more 🡒]
Flyers Running Out Of Time On A Huge Matvei Michkov Decision
The Flyers have already moved aggressively on their young core, locking up Tyson Foerster to an eight-year extension and keeping the door open on other defensemen who are eligible for new deals. But the biggest decision left on the table involves Matvei Michkov, the gifted winger who has already shown enough offensive upside to make him one of the organizations most important long-term pieces, even with injuries and a bumpy sophomore season in the mix.
Now the clock is the issue. Philadelphia has only a short window to decide whether it wants to secure Michkov on the longest possible deal available under the current CBA rules, a move that would give the club more certainty around a player it clearly views as a priority. The alternative is a shorter commitment by default, and for a team trying to line up its core, that kind of timing pressure only adds to the stakes around one of the franchises most consequential negotiations. [Read more 🡒]