We haven't heard the last thing about Cutter Gauthier's decision not to play for the Philadelphia Flyers. In reality, it is difficult to understand the attitude of the American player on this matter, who refuses to say clearly why he did not want to play in the team that drafted him fifth overall in 2022.
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And therein lies the problem. Cutter Gauthier isn't the first player to refuse to play for the team that drafted him. Adam Fox is a great example of this. He was selected in the third round by the Flames in 2016 and was traded to the Hurricanes (along with Dougie Hamilton and Michael Ferland) two years after being drafted, having warned the Alberta team's management that he did not want to play against Calgary. Ten months later, it was the Hurricanes who had no choice but to sell him and send him to the team he really wanted to play for, the Rangers. But at least Fox's intentions were clear: He wanted to play for his childhood team.
GAUTHIER'S STRATEGY
Officially, a player playing in the NCAA is not entitled to an agent. However, every player who has talent has one, but to make it look better in the eyes of American college leaders, we need to talk about a representative. Cutter Gauthier is Kurt Overhardt, who was very adept at getting his client out of the Flyers organization.
A few weeks ago he first made a list of the teams his “client” wanted to play for. He then contacted the leaders of the teams on that list to tell them of Cutter Gauthier's intentions. The strategy worked because Flyers managers suddenly received calls from some teams to see if the 19-year-old player, who plays at Boston College, could be traded.
But before they pulled the trigger, Daniel Brière (general manager) and Keith Jones (president of hockey operations) headed to Sweden to meet their first-round pick in 2022, during the World Junior Ice Hockey Championships. However, Cutter Gauthier refused to meet them and specifically to say why he no longer wanted to be in the Flyers organization.
DID GAUTHIER WANT TO PLAY IN CANADA?
At the last draft in June, the Flyers tried to get their hands on the fifth pick, the Canadiens', and offered Habs cutter Gauthier. If this trade had gone through, Kent Hughes would have had a hot potato on his hands, because it's easy to believe that Gauthier had no intention of playing in Montreal and would have either forced the Canadiens to trade him then to gain full autonomy in August 2024, as is the right of all players drafted by the NCAA.
Why wouldn't Cutter Gauthier want to play in Montreal? I learned that the American forward wasn't particularly excited about playing for a Canadian team and that none of the teams playing in Canada were on his list.
There is another important point in this whole story: several American teams were contacted by his representative a few weeks ago, but we quickly realized that there were not many teams that were really interested in his services. It's not that teams don't like his talent, but according to several executives, he was taken way too early in the 2022 draft. And that's without forgetting that his attitude toward the Flyers was a warning sign. In fact, many teams want to avoid signing a player who doesn't play fairly.