travel_dude

Just referring to their comments after BT left. Maybe just smoke being blown, since there wasn't really any other option.

Ruzicka and Duehr outplayed any prospects, no doubt there. But Zary also was IMHO the best C among the F prospects and could have taken the 4C role. Without claiming Greer, we had Hunt as the only option for the 12th F left. Because we sent Zary down, there wasn't any option other than Ruzicka at C. Claiming Greer would have demoted Zary to 13F or swapped with someone else from the AHL. We had a gap at 4C and chose to put Ruzicka there. Solovyov only needed to be better than Gilbert. Other than being injured, how much better was Gilbert? He can fight. He's okay.

I look at what Markstrom does. He comes off a poor season with a career season. Then he has a poor one. Pre-season tells me he looked bad, but it means nothing. The first 10 games is much more telling. Anything worse than 4 losses will be a bad sign. .905 in those 10 games means nothing if the losses mount up. I'm a gonna take a wait and see approach. I don't have the same confidence that Maloney and Edwards have. Happy is they are right.

Everyone hated the pick is the same as saying the consensus rankings. I read as many positive comments from the draft as negative. Many preferred a different player at the time, but by no means did they hate it. Goaltending - a poor year after a great year. Biggest changes that occurred were the swapping out of two top 10 players for one top 10 player and a guy coming off a career year, and the exclusion of one of our top 4 D. Same coaches but stubborn to use players in roles they would not succeed in. An additional 44 goals let in last season. 33 less goals scored for. What was it, 12 goals against in OT? How many 1 goal losses? In close games the lack of scoring makes a big difference. I admit that there were games that just turned me off, like the CHI game followed by the STL game. Defense - As mentioned, we settled to use our 7th D many times due to missing a top 4 D. That is not solved by draft a D today. ASP may be no closer to playing in the NHL than Poirier. How does that transfer agreement work? We need F desperately - I still stand by this. We have very few high end F prospects. Our top 2 are NHL roster with one injured. Honzek may be a ways out, but he's not a long shot to be in the NHL next season. I thought Coronato would have a tough time showing NHL readiness. He seems ready now. Took 2 years. Look, the only reason we are having this conversation is your absolute statements. You speak for yourself not the entire fanbase. I welcome the discussion based on your opinions.

Little bit of revisionist history for you? You were up and down yourself about the pick, but suggested it wasn't off the boards. Even posted this to suggest you were okay with it: https://www.sportsnet.ca/nhl/article/prospect-of-interest-why-samuel-honzek-has-potential-to-be-a-steal-in-round-1/ You may have changed your initial opinion. But very few were freaking out. Some were gleeful that we chose size and skill. Yeah a LHS, I get it. Didn't pick the top ranked player by some or most draft lists. Didn't pick a D man again in the first round. But you righfully pointed out an injury season. No slack from you now I guess. Just continue to run him down. Don't bother pumping him up next season though. Consensus is exactly what it means, so no point in inventing something. If there had been one that all scouting services agreed to and came up with one list, I guarantee you that it wouldn't match the draft selections taken against those muthical consensus picks. DET picked him with their 2nd pick after selecting a F. VAN passed him over for a pick some had as late as 22. A bunch of teams passed over him in front of us. Had we had 2 picks, I would have gone for the BPA with pick 1 and whichever F was BPA with pick 2. But we didn't. We need F. Desperately. Yeah, we have needs down the road for D. We also have several D prospects that could be stars. Maybe should have picks Wallstedt over Coroanto.

Ruzicka is suited for 4th line after playing with top players and playing like a top 6 player? But I also take some exception with the concept that top prospects should only be able to win top spots. Maybe that's how we do it. It's not the only way. Imagine Zary playing 10 minutes in the NHL with guys that are suited for the NHL. But anyway, I digress. This is the team that I will cheer for. When Pelts is back, we have other decisions to make.

We must have a different definition of consensus. It doesn't mean aggregrated or averaged. But why say there was one then say if there wasn't? Seriously. We all get it. Didn't draft your list of BPA. I blame the GM knowing that a top player like ASP was going to be snapped up in the next pick and should have traded draft positions with DET for that. Rookie GM makes those mistakes. Perhaps poor internet signals didn't let Connie view the consensus rankings. Anyway, a nothing camp for a 18 year old where he gets hurt is kinda meaningless. Only concern I have is it delays his development by months.

Huska likes him, and suggested his usage determined his output. Greer was always mentioned in BOS broadcasts, so he does impact play. I called him a tweener elsewhere because of his limited usage over the years for his age. As a 4th liner, it's not exactly a big concern over the AHL prospects, other than not giving them a spot sue to their performance this camp. The opposite is true of Greer who has no minutes playing in our camp.

Govich seems to be okay defensively. I think Ruzicka actually outplayed him on LW, but you have to fill positions as they can play. If Ruzicka can win some draws, they might actually have some O-zone presence. I like the speed on Duehr on the rish though. Greer brings AHL scoring equivalent to Phillips (for the Phillips crowd) with the size you need to play 4th line minutes. Has NHL experience, but is a bit of a tweener at age 26. PLace holder over Hunt I guess. There were other options perhaps, but whatever. He doesn't cut it, we waive him again. Good luck to Dube. Deserves top line as much as anyone from what I saw this pre-season. Always shows up in shape. Remains to be seen if Govich keeps that top 6 spot.

#Flames at practice on Monday: Huberdeau-Lindholm-Dube Sharangovich-Kadri-Coronato Mangiapane-Backlund-Coleman Hunt-Ruzicka-Duehr Hanifin-Andersson Zadorov-Weegar Oesterle-Tanev Gilbert Markstrom Vladar

So, Hunt and Gilbert were the best "prospects" available to the Flames I guess? Couple of open spots to drafted players? I guess that many years trolling the NHL as a tweener sets you apart from little to no NHL experience. From what I saw during camp, neither of these guys were consistently the better players on the ice. Doesn't really matter in the big picture, other than the dept is severly lacking past the 3rd line and 2nd pairing.

You must be rich. Come on dude, there was not a consensus pick in the teens. Lots of many different opinions, which is by definition not consensus. As soon as we draft a D in the first round, the fans complain about lack of forward prospects. We had one pick in the 1st. Blame the team for not being bad enough to finish 20th or worse.

And I heard some hack from SN suggest he was the highest paid goalie in the NHL. Bob says hi. But some context for Markstrom is due. Last year he made $8M actual and had his worse season. His best season he made $4M actual.

Vintage Markstrom saves one of two of those. First shot goals always set the team back. 60 seconds in and the team shows it's not ready. I'm not here hanging anything on the goalie for the loss. As I said, he gets better with more shots on net. He certainly did in 21/22. TBH, even last year to start he was good for the first stretch of games. Right now, I am a little concerned with the pairings. They haven't exactly looked like they were ready for regular season play. Yup, the F bear a ton of respionsibility. But, since it means nothing right now other than looking good in pre-season, I will hold any real criticism for the season. I think we should keep Dube with Kadri and Ruzicka. Put Coronato with Huberdeau and Lindholm. Govich with Backlund and Mange or Coleman. 4th line with what is left. I probably had a different opinion of the top line, but I think Coronato may be special. Has looked like he is ready more than the rest of the F. Lindholm is smart enough defensively to make up for him. Govich hasn't found a niche that works for me yet. I honestly think we need to trade Mangiapane for a real top 6 player. He's not close to Dube in skills.

I missed his tirade, but you probably noticed you can fool it by mispelling some words or stringing together several words. It's like Bill Cosby used to say, fudge is still the intent of saying the F word. Was that Bill Cosby? I remeber the original Bill Cosby show which was looselt based on his comedy routines. He certainly didn't age well. His Noah routine was the best.

Tough game to watch. Didn't seem like normal play. Wake up team, you have a season starting soon.

The head coach is a defensive coach that got egged because of Sutter. Who replaced him? Lambert? MacLean? Not sure. I don't think the preseason means Richard. Have to wait to game 1-10 to see if this was just playing to not get injured or symptomatic to the changing to a system the players aren't used to. No excuses here, just saying I'm not going to panic at pre-season play. When have we ever looked good, even with top NHL players?

The preseason means Richard, and it looked like we just wanted to play to not get injured. Coronato was told to calm down after the big hit. Saying that, the D don't look that well coached yet. Change the system, but not give it enough time to implement it. Couple of games at most where we have all the regular D in place. So, either this was a complete lack of try or it's going to take a month of regular season to sort it out. I'm not as worried about offense right now, since I think we have several options for the top 9. 4th line is still a concern with what we have left. The goaltending may actually benefit from the lack of steady play. We had stellar goaltending in the first few months of 21/22 which is when we are typically a mess. We will see. Wasn't super impressed with the effort in front of the goalie last night and Markstrom gave up a couple he should have had.

None of the three options really excite me. Hunt may be the most NHL ready of the bunch, but worse than Lewis for a 4th line option. For me, that's really disappointing. Zary should have been here over the three of them, but not my call. Solovyov is the better option for me. Gilbert is at best an option in emergency cases. His best skill is fighting. He's not really that bad, just doesn't really do anything for me.

So, according to the Giants, Honzek was injured Wednesday night and will remain in Calgary.

Joe Snively, wasn't he the real teacher sub in School of Rock?

I didn't explain this very well. We already sent down Zary, so the message to him was he's not ready.

Well the message to Zary is you are not ready. The message to Pelletier is that you are injured. It's low risk, but if you have zero interest in the player that is fine.

So, we claim him and then waive him? I suppose it could work, assuming other teams don't want to claim him at a slightly later date. In previous iteration of NHL seasons he scored 10g and 14a. A total of 34 points in 93 games. By contrast Hunt has 43 points in 202 NHL games. Ruzicka has 31 points in 75 games. My point is that making a broad statement with only 93 games played is a bit presumptory. I don't know if he is a NHL-er or not. A low risk claim with perhaps more upside than Hunt or Schwindt.

Any thoughts on Alex Nylander? On waivers. Not that high end, but very cheap. No worse than claiming Zohorna. In fact, at least he has some skills.