The Flyers trade Kevin Hayes to the Blues in the sixth round

The Philadelphia Flyers took another step in their rebuilding process on Tuesday by trading their second leading scorer, Kevin Hayes, to the St. Louis Blues.

Hayes will go to the Blues in the 2024 sixth round. As part of the deal, the Flyers will keep 50% of the $7.142 million cap from Hayes. CapFriendly projects the Blues now have $3.935 million in cap space while the Flyers have $10.3 million in cap space.

It’s a trade that fulfills a number of elements for two teams that seem to be heading in different directions.

Hayes’ acquisition gives the Blues a top-six spot that could help them return to the playoffs after they finished 37-38-7 and were 14 points behind their last college card in the Western Conference. They’re also adding a 6-foot-5 forward who arguably had the strongest season of his career while playing for a Flyers team that struggled to score.

Hayes, 31, has surpassed the 50-point mark for the second time in his career, having last done so during the 2018-2019 season when he scored 19 goals and 55 points while playing for the New York Rangers and Winnipeg Jets.

Hayes, who just finished his fourth season in Philadelphia, scored 18 goals and 54 points for the Flyers. While Hayes was a point shy of tying his career high, he was the second-highest scorer on a team that struggled to score, as evidenced by the fact that they finished 29th in goals per game.

The addition of Hayes also complements the dynamics of the Blues in the top nine down the middle with Robert Thomas and Brayden Sheen.

It is also possible for Hayes to play a role on both special teams. Hayes scored six goals on power-plays and 16 points on the extra-skater feature this season, which could be a benefit for the Blues unit who finished 22nd in power-plays with a success rate of 19.3. And while his penalty minutes have dwindled each season with the Flyers, he may be another option the Blues use to boost killing, which was 30th among 32 teams with a 72.4% success rate.

Perhaps the biggest value Hayes offers is that the Blues were able to secure a top-six spot at a reduced salary without having to give up one of their three first-round picks in the NHL Draft on Wednesday.

As for the Flyers, it’s the latest step in a rebuild that marked the change. It began when the club promoted former star Danny Brier from assistant to general manager to General Motors. The Flyers also hired another familiar face in Keith Jones, who is leaving TNT broadcasting to be president of hockey operations.

Briere had an active outside stint for a franchise that missed the playoffs for the third straight season after finishing 31-38-13 and 17 points out of the last wild card spot in the Eastern Conference.

It started when the Flyers parted ways with defenseman Ivan Provorov by sending him to the Columbus Blue Jackets in a three-team deal that also included the Los Angeles Kings.

Now that they’ve traded Hayes, the Flyers have been able to chip away at cap space while getting younger. Hayes’ departure leaves Cam Atkinson, Sean Couturier, Nicolas Deslauriers and Nick Seller as players over 30 who are still under contract with veteran winger James van Riemsdyk as a suspended unrestricted free agent.