The Philadelphia Flyers have fired Head Coach Alain Vigneault as well as Assistant Coach Michel Therrien. Mike Yeo takes over on an interim basis.

As things stand right now, Rick Tocchet is the rumored top contender to fill the role. But if that doesn't happen, the team could do worse than Mike Yeo, who has a career NHL coaching record of 246-181-55. Other rumored candidates, albeit long shots, include Mike Babcock and John Tortorella.

Fantasy Players Impacted: Until a new coach is hired, or some announcement is made with regards to the rest of this season – i.e. Yeo is made interim coach through the end of 2021-22 – then it is difficult to gauge the impact on players. Any change at all would be a good thing. Exactly one player is on pace to finish the season with more than 52 points, and that is Claude Giroux. Just four players are on pace to reach 40 points – you can add Sean Couturier, Cam Atkinson and Derick Brassard to the list.

With any coach change there will be a change in production both good and bad. So the players who are doing poorly stand to turn things around…but the same goes for players who are currently exceeding expectations. And that list starts and ends with Brassard. His strong start is at risk of slowing. But with this team the number of under-achievers is huge. Travis Konecny, Ivan Provorov, James van Riemsdyk, Keith Yandle, Rasmus Ristolainen, Travis Sanheim, Oskar Lindblom and Sean Couturier could all use a change in usage and possibly linemates.

In the Player Usage Chart below, you can see how the players are currently being implemented at even strength. Yandle is heavily sheltered while Brassard and Atkinson see heavy offensive zone starts. A new coach could choose to scratch Yandle and give some of those sweet minutes to Ristolainen or Sanheim – or maybe Cam York gets called up and sheltered. Joel Farabee is seeing tougher competition and struggling with it, so perhaps we see the new coach ease the pressure on him. JVR is getting a lot of defensive zone minutes, what would his production be like if he swapped roles with Brassard? These are situations to keep an eye out for, and if the above moves actually happen then the likes of JVR, Farabee and York become fantasy relevant again while Brassard and Yandle lose any semblance that they had.

Fantasy Players This Helps, In Order:

1. JVR
2. Joel Farabee
3. A defenseman (either Ristolainen, Sanheim or York)

Fantasy Players This Hurts, In Order:

1. Brassard
2. Yandle