Shayne Gostisbehere “is available for trade.”

It sounds like the Philadelphia Flyers are finally ready to move on from what was once one of their most promising young players. 

According to a recent article from National Hockey League insider Pierre LeBrun, the Philadelphia Flyers are looking to move 27 year old defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere, this after the talented blue liner has been the topic of trade rumors for the better part of the last two seasons. LeBrun has verified his information through multiple sources and claims that there is a key difference in the rumors this time around, the willingness of the part of the Flyers to make the trade. 

Former Flyers general manager Ron Hextall never pulled the trigger on any of those rumored trades but now it seems after just under 2 years on the job current Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher is prepared to make that deal a reality. LeBrun reports that the Flyers "have shown a serious willingness to move him" which makes it sound like this deal is getting done. 

Gostisbehere took the league by storm in his rookie season with the Flyers, recording 17 goals and 29 assists for 46 points over 64 regular season games in the 2014 - 2015 NHL season, but he was never really able to recapture that goal-scoring magic again.He eclipsed his total of 46 points in his rookie season just once, picking up 65 points during the 2017 - 2018 NHL regular season, but his production has steadily declined over the course of his two most recent season and it seems like a change of scenery is in order for both the player and the team.

It will be interesting to see how this news will be received by the Flyers fan base, given that at one point Gostisbehere was among the team's most popular players. There has certainly been considerably more negativity surrounding his play as of late, so I suspect that at least one segment of the Flyers fan base will be happy to see him go.

The question of course is how appealing will Gostisbehere be to other teams at this stage of his career and what kind of return the Flyers will be able to fetch? The one big positive for the Flyers here is that, although he carries a cap hit of $4.5 million per season, he will only earn $3.25 million in real dollars in the final 3 years of his contract. Budget teams trying to hit the cap floor, or teams wary of spending after the financial strain caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, could see value in a contract like that.