The Flyers’ red-hot 2020 season has been a rollercoaster ride from start to finish. With the encore about to resume, it’s easy to forget about the progress of guys swimming beneath the surface. One player who took a giant leap this season was 2018 first-round pick Joel Farabee.
The Flyers called him up on October 20th after watching him start his first professional season with the Phantoms in an explosive fashion, scoring a goal in each of his first three games. It didn’t take long for Farabee to make a dent at the NHL level either. 3 days after his NHL debut, he scored his first NHL point, before scoring his first goal one week later against the Devils. A four-game scoring streak was kickstarted shortly after and Farabee never looked back. In 52 games for the Flyers, Farabee amassed 8 goals and 13 assists, with a +6 rating.
Farabee & the bubble
As the team travels to Toronto, the 20-year-old left-wing is on that flight after being named to the playoff roster. It’s not yet known if Farabee will see a major role in the playoffs, but he’s remaining ready regardless.
“From my perspective, you always know what you’re going to get from me in terms of work ethic and stuff like that. Personally, I’ve been pretty happy with how I’ve prepared for this camp and how well I’ve done. It’s the coaches’ decision to put the best roster out there for the game. I just got to stay ready. If my name is called and I get the opportunity, then I’ll do it to the best of my ability.
We’ve been here before
The young American seems very composed ahead of his first taste of postseason action, and that mentality stems from a sense of confidence and familiarity. Farabee has been here before, to some extent.
Coming in, this is kind of like my second training camp. I knew the systems coming in. I feel a lot more comfortable out there as far as making small little tight plays and stuff like that. Even passes, I’m not really stressing too much on my stick. I think just the comfortability of it is really good in my head. Hopefully when we get to Toronto, we have a couple good skates. Get the exhibition game out of the way and hopefully everyone’s ready to go after that.
With an exhibition game against the Penguins taking place tomorrow, there’s a good chance that Farabee will rack up some minutes. The question then becomes ‘will he prove enough to AV to warrant a larger spot in the rotation?’ The good news for Farabee is that he will have a trio of round-robin games in Toronto to showcase his upside, too.
I think playing the top teams before is definitely good. As a team, you’re getting your reps in and stuff like that. I think those games will be a really good test for us. You dream as a kid of playing in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Obviously, I want to be on that opening night roster. I am kind of a bubble guy right now. Like I said earlier, just staying ready. If the team needs me, I’ll be ready to go.
Photo Credit: Alex Mcintyre
