The arrival of hockey season always means the arrival of a new EA Sports NHL video game. NHL 24 officially released its early access period on Tuesday (Oct. 3), and there’s a lot to take in. There are some radical changes to gameplay, a battle pass in EASHL and moments in Hockey Ultimate Team, to name a few features. The Philadelphia Flyers’ new jerseys are even in the game, IBX patch and all.
The Flyers are in the game as well, obviously, and with a new set of ratings. Fans love to argue about many parts of a sports video game and ratings are at the top of the list. Some Flyers ratings haven’t changed a lot from last year, while others have fluctuated (and, of course, there are some new faces on the team). The question everyone wants to know is, did EA Sports get it right?
Related: 3 Flyers Who Could Make the Opening Day Roster
Travis Konecny and Sean Couturier are the top Flyers forwards with a good but not great rating of 86, along with a handful of X-Factors (special abilities that capture specific strengths of their playstyles) but none too overpowering. The Flyers’ future and depth-focused offseason approach is also on display, as the team’s free agent signings rank between 78 and 80 overall. However, some player ratings seem a bit off. Here’s a look at some of them and comparables that display why EA may want to rethink things.
EA’s Overrated Flyers
Travis Sanheim (85 Overall)
EA has typically relied on old performances for their ratings, and it shows with Travis Sanheim. Though he may have top-four talent, he is coming off a brutal season where he failed to perform up to those standards. As a result, the Flyers tried to offload him this summer, unsuccessfully. But Sanheim is still an undisputed core piece in the game’s eyes. While Noah Hanifin may not have much more raw talent than Sanheim, his 38 points last season are more than Sanheim’s career-high – Hanifin also had 48 the year before, another indicator of his superiority.
Cam Atkinson (84 Overall)
In fairness to EA, it’s hard to decide how to rank a player when they haven’t actually played in over a year. But Cam Atkinson should’ve been dinged a little bit, especially given his age (34). It’s a red flag that he is rated the same as someone like Alex Killorn, who put up 64 points last season and is more physical than the diminutive Atkinson. Atkinson has only hit that threshold once in his NHL career, and that was back in 2018-19.
Sean Walker (81 Overall)
It’s a bit unfair to refer to Sean Walker as a cap dump. Like Atkinson, he’s dealt with injury troubles, missing all but six games in 2021-22 after tearing his ACL and MCL. Yes, the Los Angeles Kings did want to get rid of his salary, but that doesn’t mean Walker isn’t a useful player. The problem is that an 81 overall mark puts him close to a top-four level, which Walker simply isn’t. Jake Walman was one of the most underrated defenders in the sport last season, and he checks in at the exact same rating. So does Justin Holl, who isn’t nearly as good but still did enough to earn a three-year, $10.2 million deal in the offseason. While that may have been an overpay, Walker won’t be getting anywhere close to that much, and for good reason.
Felix Sandström (78 Overall)
It’s one thing to slot Felix Sandström in as the Flyers’ backup goalie, which is where he sits on the current virtual roster – that alone certainly isn’t a lock, but it’s defendable. It’s another to give him an NHL-caliber rating when Sandström simply wasn’t that last season. He was tied for 81st in save percentage (min. five games played) in a league with 32 teams that roster two goalies at any given time. Alex Stalock (who is 36) has a .908 career save percentage in 179 NHL games, including an identical mark on a wretched Chicago Blackhawks team a season ago. That probably deserves a higher rating than Sandström, yet EA thought otherwise.
EA’s Underrated Flyers
Owen Tippett (82 Overall)
An 82-overall rating doesn’t make for a real difference-maker in Chel terms for a forward, but Owen Tippett proved he could be that kind of player last season for the Flyers, snapping home 27 goals and looking dangerous on a consistent basis. He’s also a plus skater who received some time on the penalty kill at the end of the year. However, he comes in at the same mark as Yegor Sharangovich, a fine bottom-sixer with some versatility. Tippett is already much more than that, and given his electric shot and high-end speed, he could step into an even bigger role in the near future.
Noah Cates (82 Overall)
Like Nick Seeler, sometimes it’s hard for video games to capture the real impact of defensive players. That being said, Noah Cates put up point totals in line with fellow 82s Eetu Luostarinen and Conor Sheary and well ahead of Jeff Carter. None of those players compare to Cates’ defensive game; he finished top-15 in Selke Trophy voting last season in just his first NHL season and his first professional experience at center. Somehow, that failed to separate him from the pack of middle-of-the-road third-liners. Cates certainly exceeded that level a season ago, yet both his rating and bottom-six forward potential don’t reflect his value.
Nick Seeler (77 Overall)
A 77-overall rating would have been perfectly fair for Seeler at the start of last season. He was a quad-AAAA defenseman who wasn’t anything more than an acceptable seventh defender in the NHL. But he steadily improved to the point that he was not just a lineup regular but a stout defender by advanced metrics. You wouldn’t know that if you checked out his virtual profile, where he’s still slotted alongside Filip Roos, a 24-year-old Blackhawk with all of 17 NHL games to his name. Rating Seeler at the same level as a low-tier prospect was fair a year ago. It’s beneath him now.
The Verdict
There are underrated and overrated players on every team, which can make it hard to say who’s really deserving of a specific rating. A good way to look at ratings is to focus on what the overall number says about the player’s role. Using that, it makes it easier to see that these Flyers’ ratings don’t quite fit. None of them are egregiously off, but all could or should be raised or lowered by about three points, which would make a big difference in how the Flyers, as a whole, play on virtual ice.
