2004 chevy malibu, where the oval exhaust flange that joins that cat section to the middle resonator is leaking. The flange gasket has deteriorated, and the flange on the resonator side of the pipe is falling apart from rust (even if I were to replace the gasket itself, I doubt that the flange would support it for very long).

--> Is it possible to:

1. Remove the old gasket

2. Cut off both flange halves on each end of the joining pipes

3. Join the pipe sections with a piece of straight pipe instead of a new flange piece

In other words, is there anything bad about doing a "flange delete"?