Looking at CapFriendly, it appears the Flyers are hovering right around the cap ceiling and are using injured reserve to stay cap compliant. Many contending teams in the NHL are in a similar position, banking cap space with injured players (Ryan Ellis, in the Flyers’ case) and trading players to create room (Shayne Gostisbehere and a draft pick to the Arizona Coyotes for “future considerations”), all to stay under the threshold during the regular season.
There’s just one problem: the Philadelphia Flyers are not a contending team. If they’re not contending–which management isn’t trying to do, else they would’ve signed top talent–they should be rebuilding, but they refuse to do that as well.