June 09, 2026
Rick Osentoski/Imagn Images
Dylan Larkin submitted a trade list to the Red Wings, per a report. The Flyers weren't on it.
There probably wasn't a direct line between the Flyers and Dylan Larkin, but the team does need a top center.
So once word broke that the Red Wings captain had requested a trade late last week, fans couldn't help but start to imagine a scenario in which he might have been their guy.
But the idea may go no further than that: as just an idea.
Larkin submitted a trade list to the Red Wings, per Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press.
There are only three teams on it: The Vegas Golden Knights, the Florida Panthers, and the Minnesota Wild.
Vegas won the Stanley Cup in 2023 and is back in the Cup Final right now. The Panthers won the Cup in 2024 and 2025. The Wild are trying to make themselves the next juggernaut in line, and all three have star teammates who Larkin played with for Team USA at the Olympics – Jack Eichel and Noah Hanifin on Vegas, Matthew Tkachuk on Florida, and then Quinn Hughes, Brock Faber, and Matt Boldy on Minnesota.
You can see what Larkin is going for here, and where he thinks he has his leverage with his full no-trade clause in his contract, which right now, pushes the Flyers out of any immediate consideration.
But realistically, he isn't getting traded with that list. It's too narrow, and the three teams he wants are either short on cap space, short on premium prospects or draft picks, or short on a combination of all three, which really leaves Detroit general manager Steve Yzerman in a spot to sit and wait.
Larkin will be 30 at the end of next month, and he's under contract for four more years.
This can drag out, and get ugly.
And maybe that allows Flyers general manager Danny Brière to sit and wait for an entry point, once one side does crack. Because with where things are, at least for right now, Larkin probably will have to expand his list, which could make him more open-minded to younger teams – like the Flyers – who are on the rise.
For now, though, Larkin and the Flyers seems hard cut off as a no-go.
Same goes for another center who popped up on the rumor mill a few months back...
Robert Thomas will remain with the St. Louis Blues, at least for a while longer.
St. Louis isn't looking for a trade, and expects to have Thomas at its training camp later this summer, per Blues broadcaster Andy Strickland on Friday.
Robert Thomas trade rumors can be put to rest. The #stlblues are not looking to move their #1 center. Expect Thomas to be on the roster when training camp begins in September.
— Andy Strickland (@andystrickland) June 6, 2026
Thomas will turn 27 ahead of next season, is under contract for four more years at $8.125 million per, has Stanley Cup experience from the Blues' run to win it in 2019, and plays a tough but skilled two-way as a top-line center, which resulted in a 64-point through 64-game campaign at a plus-22 rating this past season.
The appeal for the Flyers was obvious. Thomas plays with the blend of talent and toughness that the franchise and the city have long idealized, and he's still young enough to fit in with a mostly young and still rebuilding group that only just started tapping into how good it can actually be.
But word at the time was that if the Blues were going to move Thomas, they were going to need a major haul back, which no other team seemed willing to spring for.
Now the Blues, who never seemed too serious about the idea to begin with, have walked it fully back.
Things can always change, of course, and another rough season in St. Louis can bring on a re-evaluation of where the Blues are at, along with another wave of rumors.
But right now, it appears there's nothing doing, which cuts off another potential lane for the Flyers.
Shane Wright might still be an offseason trade option.
Back during the Robert Thomas trade speculation in January, there were also rumblings surrounding the Seattle Kraken and their former 2022 fourth overall pick Shane Wright.
At the time, the Kraken were caught in limbo and on their way to missing the playoffs, and while considering potential routes for a shakeup, Wright's name was tossed out there.
Seattle's situation now isn't all that different from what it was then.
Wright is 22 and entering the last season of his three-year entry-level contract.
He finished the season with 12 goals, 27 points, and a plus-6 rating through 74 games, in a dip to his numbers from the year prior (19 goals, 44 points, plus-4 through 79 games). He's shown flashes of the star-level talent that once had him, for a while, as the consensus No. 1 overall pick for the 2022 draft, but so far, he's mostly underwhelmed – which maybe led the Seattle to start considering its options.
Matty Beniers, the Kraken's current top center at 23 years old and their second overall pick from the 2021 draft, might have fallen into that same boat.
Seattle had him signed long-term, entering Year 3 of a 7-year, $50 million deal ($7.143 million per), and he has posted back-to-back 20-goal seasons, but like Wright, he hasn't stood out as the clear-cut star that the Kraken were hoping for by now.
Seattle also has leading center prospects Berkly Catton (already on the team) and Jake O'Brien moving along, and will need the space for them at center, along with some badly needed scoring depth on the wing to supplement and possibly shift course in the process.
Maybe moving off Wright, Beniers, or both is how the Kraken do it, and maybe that brings the Flyers to the table for some much more affordable conversations.
Here's the key thing the Flyers will have to believe, though: Do they see clearly salvageable stars in either of Beniers or Wright?
Because if not, it's just adding on to the pile of Trevor Zegras, Noah Cates, Christian Dvorak, Sean Couturier, and Denver Barkey that's already there, which is a limited group, even if it is much deeper than it used to be.
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