travel_dude

Okay, so a bit off topic, but it seems Mr. Francis is suggesting BT trades for Vladar, to become the starter for TO. Not sure I get that logic, but it's an intriguing prospect. We don't need any goalies from the TO stable, but would be somewhat included to take Murray to make it work. So, I am just going to state this one based on TO's bias towards puck moving D and the inevitable retirement of Gio: To Toronto: Noah Hanifin - $4.95M x 1 year Dan Vladar - $2.2M x 2 years To Calgary: Willie Nylander - $6.962M x 1 year Jake Muzzin - $5.625M x 1 year Muzzin is likely done. The LTIR is insurance on the cap, and while it makes sense for Toronto to retain, they aren't getting a goalie and top 4 D for just Nylander. IMO.

BPA is fine, but you are talking about a conflagation of a multitude of sources for it. Does a BPA that is slow skating benefit a team needing speed? Does a BPA from the NY area who is committed to college cause you pause? Anyway, that assumes that the player said to be BPA is actually BPA. The only consensus BPA is Bedard, and some contrarion would likely say he is 2nd best. The player choices by teams are seldom BPA for all teams. So, you end up with a draft board that resembles all the playoff bracket guess that fail in round one.

Does 3rd overall get us a potential 1C ? If not, then it's a rebuild in the making. Considering they seemed top have traded away a lot of their cap. Considering that they are not exactly flush with picks over the years. Why do they trade away a possible franchise altering draft pick?

Interesting return. You have to jump on that if the prices hold up. We don't even have the spectre of a big salary for two years to deal with. I don't even worry about the perceived drop off in skills by having Kylington replace his minutes in the top 4. A better year by our goalies, possibly better seasons from player having really bad years, and a change in coaching will make a difference. Even if we don't rebound that much, it's asset management. Keeping Hanifin doesn't make us better in two years. This isn't even rebuild or re-tool talk. It's just measured improvement.

Don't want to influence how you present your list, but.... A draft ranking is just a moment in time view of where you see a player. Or how you have been influenced to make it. Why I have problems with just numbers and names is I don't see the justification for it. Pyro used to do a really good job here with projections of the player for the top 10 at least. Sometimes extended through the top 30. They showed the comps to player types and ranking of their skills and strengths. Saying that, I don't expect anyone to do that level of scouting. There are enough scouting linked through Elite Prospects. Some are free, some behind paywalls. Overall they do a good job. All I would expect you to do is say why you think player X fits us. If you suggest which players you see as being the best fit, that is very helpful. We know that no list will stand up to the actual picks, so that is perhaps helpful.

Yes, but he is a RFA with arb rights after this year. Meaning that we may be a fit and sign him or may not and walk to arbitration. The tryout period is reasonable. We could re-sign him some time after getting him. Should we not be thinking about replacing Backlund with a young star?

I looked at CAR's drafting. Jarvis the only one in the NHL since 2020 draft, good 1st rounder. Kochetkov in 2019, Svetnikov and Drury in 2018. Prior to that, they only have a handful of drafted players remaining on the team. You could say that they were part of good trades. Or they gave up on them. When looking at these two players supposedly being shopped, one is already scoring well. The other is underutilized maybe. I think we should be talking seriously with CAR. What do they need?

Oilers suck!

Supposedly CAR is shopping Necas and Drury. Not sure the reason for that. Cap space doesn't look to be the immediate reason. No word on ask for either player.

How old is MSG? They spent as much as Calgary will on renos to it. And that was some time ago. The Dome, to me, was an icon to show the world what Calgary was. The design would create some issues down the road due to environment.

So the "current" answer for winning the cup is to have 5 goalies available through the season because your top goalie is unavailable for the season. Hill has been far better in the playoffs. I tend to agree about overuse. Under Sutter in his first and second stint as HC, we have been known for doing that. Even Markstrom's 1st season, he played 75% of the games. The backup that first year had a poor W/L record. Since it was a short season in a weird environment, I would discount that trend. At the very least, we should be doing a true backup closer to 40% of games. Last year's starts made no sense where we were leading the Pacific, so 63 starts is extreme. This year where his W/L record was poor, it made less sense. Backup goalies are not always obtained through drafting. By having a large contingent, you have little availability to develop them, unless they are spread across the world. Scouting backups allows you to find the gems that another team can't keep. Hill looks like a great choice to target. Good numbers in limited roles on very bad teams.

I wonder if some people believe that he's a great hockey mind from his time as a goalie. Or the one time Jack Adams win.

So, I have some questions about ranking. He is ranked all over the map, from 12th to 36st. Even 14th by NHL Central Scouting for NA skaters. Where do you currently rank him. I know it doesn't matter where he is ranked as such. I do wonder if we would be picking a late 1st player at 16. Does is make sense, depending on the risers and fallers, that we consider dropping down or maybe targeting a 2nd first rounder. Ideally, you try to get more ammo. Just asking your opinion.

The mistake, I think, was not building them early in the season. That's both Pelletier and Phillips. Phillips actually had a decent camp not even playing with NHL'ers. Get them in early on as the extras. Don't throw them away when them make a mistake. They know what they did. Coach them to think it through. Pelletier had a lot of ambition and lots of go to his game. Blame one OTL on him and then jerk him in and out, up and down. Oops, this is a family site. Too many passengers got the pass. Role players are just that if that's all you give them. I don't know what role Lucic really had, but he seemed to be immune to poor game criticism.

So, it's down to the Flames and Rags for teams needing coaches. Hear a lot saying we should contact Patty Roy from the Memorial Cup winning team. All I remember about him coaching the AVS was the goalie pull with 4 minutes left in a game. Maybe it wasn't him but was he the coach of that team that necessitated the off-side challenge rule?

I don't relish the job of the guys making the pick. Unlike CBJ it's a brainer. I just hope it's not a Janko type pick where the smartest person in room (so he thinks) makes a choice like that. I think we do well with some picks and fail at others. I like Pelletier, but if the reason you pick him is he tells you that you would regret picking him, then I'm not sure that's a good enough reason. He may still be a good pick and the best available at the time, but he has a long way to go to prove that.

TBH, I don't think any team received assurances that Stone would sign. We wouldn't take the risk, which I get. But, think about it this way. We faced the AVS in round one and got hammered. We lacked a big body that could do something. If we couldn't re-sign him, we could trade his rights to a team that would. And that's not agiven he wouldn't sign. Anyway water under the bridge. By the sounds of what we offered in the Eichel trade, it wasn't a lot.

This is obviously a message to the fans that they are serious. We are getting Bedard and have Gaudreau, so now is the time to start winning.

No doubt a lot. Read what FN says about him, based on scouting reports... https://flamesnation.ca/news/the-son-of-a-longtime-nhler-broke-auston-matthews-single-season-junior-scoring-record

Yet some of the best markets are the warmest. California, Vegas, Florida. Fans in vegas walking to the game in 95 F degree weather. No different in early spring. Florida a bit different, but should I go to the beach or watch hockey. It 85 degrees out, hmmm I think I want to get cool. Nice cool hockey rink where I need a hoodie.

The thing that seems to favor Perreault (in rankings) is his seingle season scoring record. My preference would be Wood, Barlow first, but those may not make it to us.

Three interesting players, but not sure what the chances of them making it to us.... Colby Barlow Ryan Leonard Gabe Perreault

Can't be trusting the 6'6" guy we have or the 5'11" guy either. Anyway, not really arguing against it. I think we gotta fix the goalie development/coaching at the NHL level before we ruin anyone else.

I think if you looked at a couple of those goalies drafted, you would see a development fail. Parsons was personal, but they didn't exactly deal with him very well. Troubled young man. Gillies you may possibly blame the hip injury. Or how they chose the other guy, maybe rightly so. I think the NCAA is a risk for picking goalies. Especially ECAC or whatever they call it now.

I think we have 34 contracts of 50 right now. While it is smart to look at unsigned players, simply watching one series is not a great way to find the gems. Puljujarvi was a standout at the U18, along with Laine. Neither would be top 5 in a redraft.