cross16

With Dubas getting the Leafs GM job, many are speculating Mark Hunter won't stay and wants to leave. There isn't a natural fit here and I'm not sure how it could happen but that could be a coup of a hire for the Flames. One of the better talent evaluators in the league.

Depends on your definiton of fit. Should we expect a top line RW, NO. Those guys don't tend to move often and i'm not seeing any available in FA so that is probably not a realistic get without making a bad deal. However I would say a top 6 forwrad who can play a few different roles is a very realistic get and I think its fair to hold Treliving accountable if someone like that isn't brought it. More a question of what is the ideal fit. Does it have to be 1st line, can it be 3rd? Left hand vs right hand, goal scorer versus set up man etc. Many different ways that Treliving can short up his forward crop so I don't think it needs to be a top line option. For most of the season, the top line here was VERY good and it was the rest of the lineup letting them down. Completely reasonable approach to leave the top line alone and work on the rest of the lines in order to get better.

I feel for him. Some really bad luck there that probably ended a chance at an NHL career. Touch break for both he and the Flames. I liked this signing, just too bad how it played out.

Likely true and not a shock. Back to back knee injuries makes it really tough to invest in a prospect.

I'm not missing anything, I just don't bye or agree with your logic. I agree he did almost nothing to help the team but I happen to agree that was the right decision. This isn't the try league it's the get it done league so him making a deal so he can say well hey I tried, does nothing for me. I don't think any deal he could have made would have made the difference between making the playoffs or not. Yes it will and it was a cost the Flames could not afford. If you cannot afford something why does it make sense to still go shopping especially if it only might help? No trade deadline deal every guarantees you success and most of them tend to make no difference. How many of those teams that made those deals would have missed the playoffs if they didn't make those deals? Do we seriously want to have a discussion that if the Jets didn't pick up Statsny they would have missed? Sharks were going to miss if they didn't pick up Kane? Ducks, Flyers, and Avs all made deals that were on par to the Flames. Caps picked up a bottom pairing dman so maybe you can argue they got more but pretty silly argument IMO. How did these teams make the playoffs without making bigger deals? Like I said at the end of they day him trying to make a deal means nothing to me and this team was very likely going to miss the playoffs irregardless of whatever deal he could have made. We clearly have different versions of how a GM should operate.

Yes but that's true of any candidate that's the point. Irregardless of who he hires BT will be let get if this coaching hire doesn't work out so why does it matter if he spoke with 1 or 50 candidates? In a world as small as the NHL I absolutely think you can hire the best candidate without doing a bunch of interviews. Big, long, thorough searches can yield the same results as hiring someone you already know. Flames didn't need a big search to hire Hartley yet a long search yielded Gulutzan. A search by the Pens yielded Mike Johnston, then next to around they just promoted Mike Sullivan. Small community, not difficult to know the candidates.

I don't understand this response. If Treliving hired AV and it didn't work out would you let him hire another coach? Would the owners? I don't agree with or follow the logic of people who think Treliving should have gone the "safer" option. First of all I don't think a safer option exist when it comes to hiring a coach and second why would you want him to do that? For me and with my favorite team I want the people in charge to hire the people they think are the best for the job and do it with conviction. I think it's clear that's exactly what Treliving did.

Did you check what it cost to get those players? Flames didn't have the assets to do any of those deals. so now Treliving is getting roasted for giving up too much to improve the team and not giving up enough at the same time. Had he made a deal and still missed the playoffs, which I would suggest is very likely, would you say he did the right thing?

Such a cop out. St. Louis dealt away a top 6 center, pissed off their players and they still didn't fold like the flames did. What moves did Anaheim make? What move was he suppose to make that would have got the flames into the playoffs. Flames had more then enough to get into the playoffs but their group, players and coaches, didn't get it done.

Yes Nenshi did float the idea that they could do an Olympic bid and use Edmonton's arena.

I'm becoming more pessimistic a deal will be worked out because I think Edwards fully plans on moving this team unless he gets exactly the deal that he wants. The deal that he wants is a really poor deal for the City and one i'm not seeing this council agreeing to and as a tax payer i'm not really for it either. Not feeling very good about this at all anymore. Hope i'm wrong but glad to see the City wants to reach out at least.

Flames responded fairly quickly....

This is both a little surprising and pretty cool....

Looks like the list is capped at age 25, but Mangiapane led the AHL in goals per game last year. Foo makes an appearance on this as well.

I don't think they can afford both and I don't think they can afford, from a playing time perspective, to have Holtby, Grubauer and Samsonov all in the NHL and i'm not sure Samsonov is coming over to play in the A. Probably too good for it too. so we'll see. I'm not a fan of Grubauer personally. I think he is a career backup or 1B at best, I don't see starter and just never have so I wouldn't be interested in giving up a bunch of assets for him or a good asset.

If you want to "blame" someone it's Brad Pascall. He is Stockton's GM, not Conroy. Sure there are injuries but did the Ducks use 39 players and 7 different goalies this year? Stockton did. Again this is a catch 22 though. First off, its not easy to go out and get good veteran players once the season starts but Stockton did do that but again for every veteran player you get it cost your own prospects ice time. With Foo gone, Porier get's elevated and responds with 10 points in 8 games. With Mangiapane out, Brett Pollock put up 13 points in the final 20 games. Kylington with 8 points in the final 14 with Rasmus up here. Dube with a chance to play late and put up 4 assists in 6 games. Klimchuck with 11 points in his final 16 with Mangiapane out. For every veteran you sign it's going to cost your own prospect ice time so I again I don't think the equation is as simple as you make it. I'd much prefer those 5 players get the chance to fill in for the injuries/call ups then some guy who is will never make the NHL. This is not to say that I think the Flames are great at drafting or anything because honestly the AHL Is not always a great barometer of drafting success as quite often the successful teams down there are not due to draft picks, it's due to veteran AHL players.

Every team has injuries yes but the severity and ramifications differ. Tampa had a bunch of key injuries last year and missed the playoffs as a result. Injuries aren't an excuse but they are a reason. Again we are talking about a team that missed it by 1 win, wasn't like Stockton was terrible. I seem to recall Brad Pascall saying that they are one of the youngest teams in the AHL and I thought he said they said some of the higher player movement as well.

Or maybe some of us are more realistic. Stockton lost their top two centres for almost the entire season (Jankowski to NHL and Hrvik to injury) lost their best player and top scorer for the last 2 months if the season due to injury, and then down the stretch lost 2 of their best dmen, top RW and their goalie to the NHL. Let alone the amount of call ups, specifically goalies, during the season and still were a win away from the playoffs. There's was also some very good growth in more than a few prospects.

We're turning this into a black or what issue that it really isn't. The Choice is not winning or developing, nor do the Flames not want to win. The difference in their strategy is they won't bring in the AHL veterans. Typically when you look who has success in the AHL it's not teams that are rich in prospects, its full of guys whose NHL careers are over. Difference for the Flames is instead of signing those AHL veterans they want their prospects to play. For the the most part it's not a very strong link between AHL franchise success and the NHL. Even the crunch, Tampas affiliate, has missed the playoffs in 5 of the last 9 seasons. Hershey Bears are one of the more successful in the AHL but have provided very little in the way of prospects to the caps. Stockton wants to win, they just want to win with their own guys.

The Flames primary goal of their farm team is to develop players for the NHL. That doesn't mean they don't want to make th playoffs, they do, but the primary goal is developing players. So that means putting specific players in certain situations that may sacrifice a win, but will help the players inter long term. They also refrain from a lot of AHL veteran type signing thst are typical of teams that have AHL success and instead play their prospects.

Already tired it. Flames hired McLennan from 08-10 and he ended up leaving. If I recall correctly he didn't enjoy coaching.

I"m not really for an argument on this. IMO we are not qualified to say a goalie coach is doing a good or bad job because we don't get to Hash Rate his day to day. We only Hash Rate results and results bring into play far more factors that are outside of a coaches control. If goalie coaching was so critical and of such high importance then why is the success rate of goalies so varied across organizations? You can bring up Allaire as probably the last great goalie coach and even his impact on the game has dwindled to nothing. He taught a revolutionary style and once the sport caught up his impact became nill. I don't care if the Flames keep or fire Sigalet nor am i advocating they keep him. All I would say on this is I would have liked to see more talented goalies brought into the organization instead of the "best prospects not in the NHL" and a couple late round picks. I think the results of the Flames goalies since Kipper speaks more to their ability/job of bringing in goalies then it does their goalie coach.

Yup and Danny Sabourin had a shutout in the NHL too. Randomness.

If that is what you take away then sure come work for me.