cross16

Also...

Treliving for me is a bit polarizing. There are some excellent moves that you shouldn't be able to pull off, but then there are also ones that you can't see this thought process. So it's tough. That's being said I still think all things considered he bats well above avg. I also don't see the lack of an identity personally. I think if you look at the scouting, player development and moves Treliving has made he is building a team that's basis is speed, skill, puck possession, while not wanting to forget about being tough. I think he wants to build a team that can play the game anyway you want to play it, but is not going to build a team that has to rely on physical play to win. Now, as with every team really, there is going to be a player move or two that may not always fit the identity but this building a team isn't an exactly science either, it's a bit of a chemistry experiment. I don't think Jagr fits what Treliving wants, but the risk was worth trying to see if may it could work. I think as fans we often forget that a lot of the sports industry is built upon a roll of the dice chance. There is just no exact science to building a team or building a winner. I think if you look at how this team played from November through to the playoffs last year you saw the image of what Treliving wants in a team and I think for the most part that was pretty good. Have you seen that this year? No of course you haven't but I also don't think that necessarily means you abandon ship either.

Engelland, Stone, heck he and Wideman were actually not a horrible pairing when you look at the numbers. It doesn't have to be a blame situation. It's not like you have to blame Brodie and defend Hamonic or vice versa. The easier, and likely correct answer, is both are not playing well enough. Problem I have with Hamonic is he's looked bad since day 1 here, he looked bad last year, he looks slow, constantly chasing, and his only play is glass and out which is problematic. Can't blame Brodie for that.

Problem I had with acquiring Hamonic is you paid a premium price for a guy coming off a terrible year and a half. I could understand a rolling of the dice to see if he could go back to the Hamonic of a few years ago but then the price should reflect that. Flames paid a premium for a player who was one of the worst performing Dmen in the NHL last year, it was not a very shrewd moving on Trelivings part and unfortunately its blowing up in his face. I know we can talk about Hamilton and how he struggled when he first got here but I don't believe the situations are the same. Hamonic has been this bad for well over a season now and because this is becoming the norm, not the exception, i've basically lost all hope he can be fixed. When I watch him play I don't see it being a fit issue I just think he's overrated and the knee injuries he's suffered has really sucked his foot speed.

I'm not saying saying this will happen to Gilles, but I think Malcolm Subban is a great example of why it's tough to judge and evaluate goalies. His own team said he was done and the consensus was his AHL results "weren't good enough" and on paper they appeared that way. Looks pretty good at the NHL level now... Let things play out and you never know what some can do with an opportunity.

No, he's a free agent But if he has a 3 year contract signed in 2016 he won't be eligible to play in the NHL until 2019. Unless he has an NHL out in his contract, which is unlikely i'd say.

That's an old article. From April before the Flames pulled the plug on negotiations.

And I agree to be clear i've never said the NHL shouldn't go to Korea. I believe the NHL should ideally be at all Olympics, although I understand their point of view on Korea, but that it would just make no sense at all to pass on Beijing. It's less about getting peole to play hockey and more about the potential for future investment in the game.

Lack hans't been a NHL goalie in well over a season. I'm not sure why we should expect him to suddenly get his confidence back. he's done.

They already did it to Freddie Hamilton

It's about product placement. Game is really difficult to grow on TV or generate much excitement, as judged by the fact there has been how many Olympics and growth internationally really isn't much of a thing for the NHL. Not to mention, the NHL is already trying to woo Chinese investment and drum up interest given the market size and potential in China. Would be a pretty bad look for them to pitch the NHL in China and then not send their athletes to the games.

Sounds like a Forever a Flame ceremony. Let's be honest, Kipper wouldn't do an interview unless there was a reason

id like to see Rittich brought up. Let Gilles continue to play and Rittich looks like he deserves the call. Hopefully that is the move but just because he's on waivers doen't mean they are making a move. Be awesome if someone grabs him.

The fact that one has a substantially bigger population base, market, and economy than the other.

I don't think for 1 second the NHL would not participate in an Olympics held in North America. Both tournaments held in North America were great showcases for the game and the NHL has pretty much outright said they want to be part of Bejing in 2022 as well. They just don't see the value in shutting down the season and risking the injury to send players to a market like Korea.

To provide some context he did say it was just an option. That being said, I think it's still embarassing it's even a legitimate option. Seems very much like trying to save face about the arena fiasco. I don't mind the idea of some events being split out to other areas but then I just start to question more and more why we are going down this path? I get the idea is to help reduce cost but if you can't play the marquee event, ie the Hockey medal round/gold medal game, then you are going to really reduce your profit as well. As much as I would love Calgary to host the Olympics, i have zero faith that this council could pull it off.

Nenshi also said a new arena is not a necessity to host the Olympics and that "theres a nice new arena 3 hours up the road". Such an embarrassing statement to make... Not even just about the lack of an arena here, the fact that you would want to host the Olympics and spend hundreds of millions of dollars to do so but are willing to not have the marquee event makes no sense whatsoever.

http://www.naturalstattrick.com/ is a great site to check out for stuff like this. They don't break down Low-Med-High but they break down a lot of other data. The sites I use for Low-Med-High danger are goalie stat only sites and they generally don't break that down until the season is complete. Doesn't mean they don't exist I just don't have one. I did look at the 5 on 5 data though last year to this year per 60 mins. I'll post this year's number and whether its higher. Shots against - 31.92 an increase of 3.3 from last year. however, worth nothing that the median increase league wide is just shy of 1 extra shot per game given the way NHL counts shots now. GAA - 2.22 verus 2.24 last year Scoring Changes against - 27.55. an Increase of 2.4 over last year. High danger Scoring changes against - 10.31 and increase of 0.5 over last year. The stats are a little worse when you include all strengths but that underscores how bad the PK is this year and how much the PK is dragging them down.

I think that's likely two fold. 1- they are terrible on the PK so anytime you watch/listen and have they have multiple PK it will look terrible. 2 - when they've been bad it's pretty bad. It's not like they have a slight off night, they have really poor night. Not a lot of in between. Generally speaking 5 on 5 the Flames are pretty sound and they definitely play a possession oriented game.

There really isn't much chatter at all about the Flames moving or selling. The only really "new" bit that has come out was John Shannon wirting his opinion that Houston wanting a team will eventually get linked to Calgary. I've heard no one credible suggest the Flames want to move or want to sell. They are just standing by their "we are done negotiating and will play here as long as we can stance" and reporters are making suggestions on the rest. If Gary Bettman didn't want the Flames in Canada he's had multiple opportunities to move them and he hasn't.

Acquiring a goalie that you needed to "fix" when you had already acquired your starter and talked about how part of the reason you like him is the workload he can handle, doesn't make a lot of sense and is inconsistent with the win now mode he had in the off season. I think Treliving and the Flames went for a cheaper option and now they are paying for that decision. I'm not ripping BT, but I just think it's clear he made a mistake and that happens. It doesn't make sense to acquire a guy you plan to play 55-60 games and then pick up a backup that you need to get games in order to help him improve. Sure you can argue the Flames should have played Lack in a game or two more this season but I have 2 issues with that. 1- he's been bad since day 1 of camp so why do we think an extra game or two at the NHL level is going to change anything and 2 - with how Smith has played when was a good time to take him out and put in a guy that hasn't looked good? Don't think that was the reasoning. Johnson was pretty candid in his post season interviews that he wanted a chance to compete for time and Treliving also made it seem like that once they signed Smith Johnson really had no interest in coming here. I also don't think the Flames were prepared to pay over 2 million bucks for a backup.

I don't agree with the rationale of having to accept a trade because the cost was low. If it was wrong to target the player than it's a bad trade irregardless of what you paid for it. Would just make it worse if the cost had of been higher. I think you really have to question why the Flames wanted to target Lack in the first place.

I think the PK is too soft, particularly at the blueline. For any PK I think it's tough to stop a PP once they are in the zone and set up so stop them at the blueline or at least make it difficult. I thought last year the Flames did a good job in the neutral zone to at least protect the line and make an entry more challenging but now it seems like they are just letting teams walk right in and set up. Even if you have perfect execution in your own zone, letting a team set up so easily is likely going to lead to alot of issues on your PK. But I agree, the PK is the biggest issue with this team. so even though the team results look pretty meh I think the team defense has been stronger than it appears. Goal scoring and the PK are the two biggest reason why this team isn't performing better right now IMO.

A day after he attended a good friends funeral too. Tough week for him for sure. I put zero stock into how he played last night.

Personally I don't think it's time. Hamonic is still working his way in and personally I think any new acquisition takes more than 20 games to get acclimated but that's me. Depends on what your benchmark was. If you were expecting one of the best D cores in the league yes, but I would probably suggest that rating was overrated to begin with. I think the Flames had a very good top 4 on paper, but a poor looking 3rd pairing. so far they've had a very good top pairing, a slightly below avg 2nd pairing (which I put a lot on Hamonic and his struggles so far) and a poor 3rd pairing. Kulak-Stone has breathed some life into that but they still arnt' great in their own end. 5 on 5 so far this year: 11th in Corsi Against 26th in Fenwick agaisnt 17th in Shots Against 13th in scoring chances against 10th in High danger scoring chances against. I expected a top 10 blue line/defensive team this year and so far I would saw the results suggest they are about middle of the pack, so a little below but the trend the last 10 games is more positive (obviously throwing out last nights game). If Hamonic can stabilize I think they'll be appropriately rated.