Maybe the most controversial thing the Philadelphia Flyers have done under general manager Danny Briere has been their decision at the draft table the last two years. Mostly, the choice to opt for center Jett Luchanko over defenseman Zeev Buium, who is carving out a nice start to his NHL career after dominating college hockey.
That’s boring though. Yawn — oh, the Flyers made their choice based on position and possibly based on Buium sharing an agent with the prospect who told them to f–k off and forced a trade to the market with the least amount of pressure in the entire league. Briere already explained their decision to not take Buium and select the super-young and speedy center in Luchanko almost immediately after they made the pick. It’s not new news and now it’s just a part of reality.
But now? The hot new thing is to look at the prospect selected after Luchanko at 14th overall — center Konsta Helenius of the Buffalo Sabres.
Comparing prospects so early is a waste of time
Helenius was the consensus pick after Buium was gone. In the seconds between selections, as almost every single Flyers fan waited for Briere to make the call and publicize the team’s decision, there was an oh okay, so Helenius it is, then sentiment that spread across everyone’s minds. But, they decided to not take the Finnish center that had skating and pace problems, but instead went for the guy from the OHL that skates really damn fast, is as defensively sound as anyone at his age, and is also the youngest player in the entire draft class.
It is a decision that we have obviously all thought about for years now and gets brought up whenever someone wants to be mad about this team as Luchanko is still just a teenager and because of stupid rules, having to play in the OHL. But now it has come up once more for the most online of Flyers fans to get extremely upset about.
Helenius just played his second NHL game on Tuesday night as the Sabres earned a big 5-3 win over the lowly Nashville Predators. But what really set some fans over the edge is the fact that in the first period of that game, Helenius managed to earn two primary assists and then scored a goal on a heck of a shot for his first NHL goal.
It proved to be the most perfect opportunity for everyone to freak out about the pick once again. Panic strikes so easily in the hearts of fans as soon as a player selected soon after a Flyers selection does something notable and at this point in time, it is so stupidly early to be jumping to any conclusion about any draft decision this team makes, even as far back as two years ago.
Sure, Helenius having a performance like that in his second NHL game while Luchanko has had eight total appearances with the Flyers in the last two seasons and has yet registered his first point, is not a good look on paper. But it’s all about the limited scope of what we see — Luchanko’s two stints with the Flyers were at the start of the season, one as a freshly turned 18-year-old who was just drafted months prior, and then a 19-year-old trying to catch up under a new coach while he also missed a large portion of training camp.
That context does not favor Luchanko, or give him the right opportunity, in the slightest. Add the fact that Helenius has had the ability to play in the AHL as a teenager because of being drafted out of Europe, and him getting up to the speed of the professional game for the last several months, and that is another bit of context that raises Helenius’s likelihood of pulling something like his off.
And maybe the real kicker is the vastly different opportunities these two young centers were given. Luchanko was thrown down on the fourth line and during the four games this season, his most common teammates were Nikita Grebenkin and Garnet Hathaway. Compare that to Helenius being on the wing and playing with Noah Ostlund and Zach Benson, two young former first-round picks that have proved to be very solid NHL and contributing players. Hell, the defenseman that was on the ice with Luchanko the most was Noah Juulsen this season. That’s not a way for a young center to get some scoring touches under his belt.
It’s too early to make any real and true criticisms
We’re not necessarily giving Luchanko excuses — he wasn’t very noticeable (or good) during his NHL stint this season. But instead of just pointing a giant finger at the teenager and blaming all of the Flyers’ misfortunes on the decision to take him instead of some Finnish child who managed to score in his second NHL game, there are reasons why the two different results for Luchanko and Helenius has happened.
It is just where we are now and we have the information we have. If the NHL decided to instill the rule that one 19-year-old from the CHL can play in the AHL this season instead of next, and the Luchanko we saw in the Phantoms’ playoff run last year showed up throughout this season, we would be all fanning ourselves over the thought of this guy from London, Ont. in the team’s middle six for the next decade. But, Luchanko had to waddle his way back to the OHL and is now on the best team in junior hockey after a blockbuster trade and is working out the kinks after experiencing the NHL and AHL just months ago.
That’s what we have to go off of. It’s not great. It’s actually pretty bad to be in this situation, but it requires a whole lot of patience just to see how things pan out. Helenius could go on a historically bad stretch and we would all forget his name entirely by season’s end; it’s possible. And maybe, reasons like his skating and pace of play will eventually catch up to him as Luchanko excels in those areas. Even if both end up being third-line centers that score roughly the same amount of points, it all comes down to playstyle and how effective they are in other areas of the game. There’s more than just looking at the raw stat line and determining that the Flyers have made the wrong decision.
It is not that this comparison and complaining and criticism cannot ever happen, but I would probably wait until Luchanko plays more than four games in an NHL season and doesn’t have the broken-down corpse of a veteran bottom-sixer and a prospect who will top out as a bottom-sixer, as his linemates.
There will be a time where we can look back and see if the Flyers made the right decision. I would just personally choose to really hammer down and make my stance on a draft pick known a few years down the road, not when these players have barely played in the NHL and one just so happened to have a shot go in on a low-danger play.
The frustrations had with this team who has not seen the playoffs in way too long and while undergoing a rebuild have made against-the-grain decision at the draft table, is somewhat understandable. But now with the players and prospects all here, there should be at least a breath taken before the fingers get pointed or wagged.
Patience is just needed, and that really needs to be stressed as tweets and posts came in as soon as Helenius scored his goal and had his three-point period. That’s all.
