Joe Veleno is the perfect buy-low candidate for the Flyers this offseason. (Photo: David Banks, Imagn Images)
After losing Ryan Poehling in the Trevor Zegras trade, the Philadelphia Flyers need another reliable two-way center.
While Zegras may very well end up converting back to center full-time, he's not the guy the Flyers want playing high-pressure defensive minutes, and especially not on the penalty kill.
There are a quite a few interesting veteran options for that archetype of player on the NHL free agent market this year, but the Flyers, just like at the goalie position, will face hot competition from Stanley Cup contenders.
Names like Radek Faksa, Nick Bjugstad, and Nico Sturm would be fantastic stopgap options, but with a little extra searching, the Flyers can find themselves a more permanent replacement in Joe Veleno.
Veleno, 25, is a former first-round pick who is set to be bought out by the Seattle Kraken after being traded by the Chicago Blackhawks for Andre Burakovsky last week.
Veleno was, of course, already traded once this season, with the Detroit Red Wings bringing in Petr Mrazek and Craig Smith and sending Veleno to Chicago.
All in all, the 2024-25 season was a tougher go for the former 30th overall pick, although Veleno's five points in 16 games with Chicago was markedly better than the 10 points he had in 56 games with the Red Wings.
Coming into the year, Veleno was fresh off a career-high 28 points with the Red Wings, emerging as a strong penalty killer and a physical presence.
Veleno was emerging as a strong two-way bottom-six forward before putting together a so-so 2024-25 season playing on two bad teams. (Evolving-Hockey)Veleno's GAR card above is similar to Poehling's before he joined the Flyers; Veleno's is more well-rounded, while Poehling was in the 80th percentile of defense due to some elite penalty kill play.
If the Flyers are in on Veleno, they'll get some intel from defenseman Jamie Drysdale, who won the 2019-20 IIHF U20 Men's World Championships with Veleno and Canada a few years back.
Going back another year, Veleno played with Flyers forward Owen Tippett and former Flyers center Morgan Frost on the 2018-19 U20 Canada team.
The 25-year-old is having a two-year, $4.55 million contract cut short with the buyout, so it's unlikely Veleno will cost the Flyers much more than something in the range of $1 million.
The 6-foot-1, 200-pound forward has thrown over 100 hits in each full season of his NHL career and is a respectable 46.6% for his career in the faceoff dot.
The combination of size, potential, physicality, and versatility should be attractive to a smaller Flyers team, and Veleno is much more seasoned than Rodrigo Abols, for example.
He should be one of their top targets heading into the start of NHL free agency Tuesday.
