Lucic for Neal Trade

[Ward54]

I hated this trade when I first heard about 9 hours ago. But I took the time to read all the posts and do a little research and now I don't hate it and I don't love it but I am ok with it.

I can't get past the fact that Neal was a healthy scratch for game 5. I don't think there is any coming back from that as a flame. He will now join his 4th team in 4 years. Preds exposed him, Vegas let him walk and now we have traded him. I'm thinking he may not be such a great locker room guy.

Lucic comes with a terrible contract and I don't understand the conditional pick at all but while his points totals are dropping his possession numbers aren't that bad. 

If the addition of Lucic allows our skilled players to "play big" as Iggy described it and he is remains capable of taking a regular shift I am ok with it. I don't know where he fits exactly but Neal didn't fit anywhere. 

[Thebrewcrew]

At first, I was a little annoyed at how we didn’t get Puljujärvi. But after thinking it over, I don’t think BT thinks he was doing the Oil a favour, he really thinks Lucic is better than Neal. If he didn’t feel that way I’m sure he would have tried to get more.

 

Anyway, it seems like Lucic actually wants to be here, which is nice. Commodore whose good friends with Neal mentioned on Spittin Chiclets last year, that Neal was having an expletive-ridden time in Calgary. 

 

This cant be it for BT on the trade front though. He added a bottom 6 forward, nice, we need a top 6 winger badly still 

[flames-fan-in-jets-land]

4 hours ago, Ward54 said:

I hated this trade when I first heard about 9 hours ago. But I took the time to read all the posts and do a little research and now I don't hate it and I don't love it but I am ok with it.

I can't get past the fact that Neal was a healthy scratch for game 5. I don't think there is any coming back from that as a flame. He will now join his 4th team in 4 years. Preds exposed him, Vegas let him walk and now we have traded him. I'm thinking he may not be such a great locker room guy.

Lucic comes with a terrible contract and I don't understand the conditional pick at all but while his points totals are dropping his possession numbers aren't that bad. 

If the addition of Lucic allows our skilled players to "play big" as Iggy described it and he is remains capable of taking a regular shift I am ok with it. I don't know where he fits exactly but Neal didn't fit anywhere. 

That pretty much sums up the entire way I reacted to the trade. My big worry now is Neal becoming a 20+ goal guy again which will make the trade seem worse that it already does.

[cross16]

16 minutes ago, flames-fan-in-jets-land said:

That pretty much sums up the entire way I reacted to the trade. My big worry now is Neal becoming a 20+ goal guy again which will make the trade seem worse that it already does.

 

I look at that differently. 

 

If if it takes playing with the Oilers (ie McDavid/Drasait/Nuge/PP time) to get Neal back to around 20 goals and 40pts at over 6million per season that’s a loss for the Oilers. That’s still a really poor investment. 

[phoenix66]

16 minutes ago, flames-fan-in-jets-land said:

That pretty much sums up the entire way I reacted to the trade. My big worry now is Neal becoming a 20+ goal guy again which will make the trade seem worse that it already does.

Yep..personally I think he will but at the end of the day, 2 teams got rid of a problem. I'm not jumping on the couch but I don't hate it .

On our side the good news is we don't need Lucic to score  any more than we relied on Hathaway to score . Production is a bonus .we were perceived as a soft team, we should not have that perception any more 

Oilers are banking on Neal rebounding.

 

Both teams still have players that provide what the other player is taking with them.. Oilers still have Kassian, nurse etc to be tough.. they needed Lucic to score ..so they won't miss him

Flames have Czarnik, mangiapane who outplayed Neal..so we won't miss him here .

 

The irony is , we have more 4 line depth than Edmonton so the odds are good that Lucic likely will score more here than he did in Edmonton..

The conditional pick is merely insurance against Neal bouncing back

 

I would have greatly preferred JP in the deal, but at the end of the day ..I'm happy to have the player in Calgary having no expectations of him being a scorer 

[JTech780]

1 minute ago, cross16 said:

 

I look at that differently. 

 

If if it takes playing with the Oilers (ie McDavid/Drasait/Nuge/PP time) to get Neal back to around 20 goals and 40pts at over 6million per season that’s a loss for the Oilers. That’s still a really poor investment. 

 

Just to add to your thoughts, even if Neal returns to 20 goals with the Oilers, it really shouldn't be all the concerning for us for two reasons.

 

1. He wasn't going to score 20 goals for us and would have continued to struggle and put up similar numbers as last year. He just didn't fit here. 

 

2. If he does score 20 goals, that's all he will do, he doesn't play defense, his physicality is really overblown and mostly non existent, he doesn't make his teammates better.

[travel_dude]

1 minute ago, cross16 said:

 

I look at that differently. 

 

If if it takes playing with the Oilers (ie McDavid/Drasait/Nuge/PP time) to get Neal back to around 20 goals and 40pts at over 6million per season that’s a loss for the Oilers. That’s still a really poor investment. 

 

If they are looking for another 20 goal scorer, they signd one for 2.1m, who now won't get as many minute to replicate it.

They became softer by picking up Neal, who was remarkably soft last year.

So, they are paying 6.5m + 2.1m in hopes of having one of them pot 20 goals.

On the other hand, we are paying slightly less to replace 7 goals.

We became tougher to play against.

 

The trade by itself does little for us.

Doesn;t solve the cap problems.

Add a wrinkle of a NMC to deal with come expansion.

Adds a LW to a LW heavy team.

 

I hate the trade terms, not the players involved.

We have to fix the cap, and that is not easy.

We are not the only team with issues, but there are less teams that we can trade wth to fix the problems.

Stone is a buyout certainty now.

Frolik will be gone for no improvement.

Brodie has to go to add a RW or RHS C.

[JTech780]

4 minutes ago, travel_dude said:

 

If they are looking for another 20 goal scorer, they signd one for 2.1m, who now won't get as many minute to replicate it.

They became softer by picking up Neal, who was remarkably soft last year.

So, they are paying 6.5m + 2.1m in hopes of having one of them pot 20 goals.

On the other hand, we are paying slightly less to replace 7 goals.

We became tougher to play against.

 

The trade by itself does little for us.

Doesn;t solve the cap problems.

Add a wrinkle of a NMC to deal with come expansion.

Adds a LW to a LW heavy team.

 

I hate the trade terms, not the players involved.

We have to fix the cap, and that is not easy.

We are not the only team with issues, but there are less teams that we can trade wth to fix the problems.

Stone is a buyout certainty now.

Frolik will be gone for no improvement.

Brodie has to go to add a RW or RHS C.

 

Trading Neal was never going to solve the cap issues, we were always going to have to take back another bad contract. Trading Neal was always about getting rid of a player that didn't fit with the team and didn't fit with the coach.

 

Moving Stone, Brodie and Frolik was always going to happen regardless of trading Neal.

[GM_3300]

11 hours ago, travel_dude said:

 

I'm just reacting to having to use move two good LW to RW just because we cab't seem to solve roster issues.

Let's not pretend that Lucic will make a better 3rd line.

Add to that, we move Bennett to line that has worked well without him.

 

If Frolik or Brodie bring back a top 6 RW, this trade is more reasonable because we have improved the team.

 

Do I really care about losing Neal?  Not really.

Am I disappointed about the trade?  Yes.

Did this do anything to improve the team, the cap or the long term outlook?  Not that I can see. 

 

Meanwhile NYR is capped out and we can;t even make a bad trade for better players.

We supposedly were targeting a better 3rd line C and we got a LW.

Not even a younger player.

 

I don't think Treliing can be done by any means with this deal and I certainly don't see the fix being Bennett and Mangiapane over to RW This is where I would move Bennett back to C the 3rd line with Lucic on LW. Our RW still needs a lot of work.

[phoenix66]

25 minutes ago, JTech780 said:

 

Just to add to your thoughts, even if Neal returns to 20 goals with the Oilers, it really shouldn't be all the concerning for us for two reasons.

 

1. He wasn't going to score 20 goals for us and would have continued to struggle and put up similar numbers as last year. He just didn't fit here. 

 

2. If he does score 20 goals, that's all he will do, he doesn't play defense, his physicality is really overblown and mostly non existent, he doesn't make his teammates better.

Whats really laughable is the oiler boards now calling for 35+ goals from Neal next year..lol

Ya I can see the 21 but he's not suddenly finding the fountain of youth 

 

What makes me feel better in this, was hearing that he spoke with BT..he also spoke with Peters . This tells me BP is on board and knows where he wants him to fit ..  Neal was always BPs 2nd choice for the top line , like he was given a Tetris piece and told to Fit it in somewhere 

 

He phrased it much more diplomatically but I'm also encouraged by Lucic saying he was sick of losing ..trying to do too much.. just wants to play his game again and have it actually mean something   

Losing can suck life out of you..he's always been a player that brings it when games mean something ..we should see a better version of Lucic here than Edmonton saw for the last 2 years 

[GM_3300]

5 minutes ago, phoenix66 said:

Whats really laughable is the oiler boards now calling for 35+ goals from Neal next year..lol

Ya I can see the 21 but he's not suddenly finding the fountain of youth 

 

What makes me feel better in this, was hearing that he spoke with BT..he also spoke with Peters . This tells me BP is on board and knows where he wants him to fit ..  Neal was always BPs 2nd choice for the top line , like he was given a Tetris piece and told to Fit it in somewhere 

 

He phrased it much more diplomatically but I'm also encouraged by Lucic saying he was sick of losing ..trying to do too much.. just wants to play his game again and have it actually mean something   

Losing can suck life out of you..he's always been a player that brings it when games mean something ..we should see a better version of Lucic here than Edmonton saw for the last 2 years 

Big maybe here.

[phoenix66]

1 minute ago, GM_3300 said:

Big maybe here.

True ..but as mentioned before his bar is low 

We don't need him to outperform Neal..we need him to be better than Hathaway..complete game wise ... Anything more , is a bonus

[travel_dude]

12 minutes ago, JTech780 said:

 

Trading Neal was never going to solve the cap issues, we were always going to have to take back another bad contract. Trading Neal was always about getting rid of a player that didn't fit with the team and didn't fit with the coach.

 

Moving Stone, Brodie and Frolik was always going to happen regardless of trading Neal.

 

We are selling low on a player and buying low on a replacement.

Seems like the wrong time of year to do that.

Priority was to sign the RFA's and fix the cap.

 

Personally, I don't care about Neal going.  He won't make a difference in either city.

But, I think people are trying to justify it in their own mnds by suggesting there was no other option.

Lesser players have had more than one season to justify their contracts.

The coach's job is to make it work.

[JTech780]

10 minutes ago, travel_dude said:

 

We are selling low on a player and buying low on a replacement.

Seems like the wrong time of year to do that.

Priority was to sign the RFA's and fix the cap.

 

Personally, I don't care about Neal going.  He won't make a difference in either city.

But, I think people are trying to justify it in their own mnds by suggesting there was no other option.

Lesser players have had more than one season to justify their contracts.

The coach's job is to make it work.

 

The coaches job is to win games, not to try and make one player happy. I believe we have a better chance of winning with Lucic than Neal. I think the same can be said in reverse for the Oilers.

 

We also don't know what the situation was with Neal, the coaching staff or management. Perhaps Neal requested a trade. Perhaps the relationship was so untenable that the only thing to do was to move Neal.

 

At the end of the day I think the move makes sense for Calgary, but I get the opposition.

[GM_3300]

15 minutes ago, phoenix66 said:

True ..but as mentioned before his bar is low 

We don't need him to outperform Neal..we need him to be better than Hathaway..complete game wise ... Anything more , is a bonus

Lucic 5M > Hathaway 1M yeah I see the advantage now.

[JTech780]

 

Neal's last shift as a Flame.

[phoenix66]

17 minutes ago, GM_3300 said:

Lucic 5M > Hathaway 1M yeah I see the advantage now.

More like , pay Hathaway $1.5 over 4 years... Or pay Lucic -$500k I call that a win 

We didn't lose anything trading Neal..we already have his replacements on the payroll

We dropped our payroll adding Lucic and replacing Hathaway with a better player for that position 

 

Now the most critical question that needs to be answered above all else ... Is will he really wear 17?  Or will Czarnik give up 27

[GM_3300]

1 minute ago, phoenix66 said:

More like , pay Hathaway $1.5 over 4 years... Or pay Lucic -$500k I call that a win 

We didn't lose anything trading Neal..we already have his replacements on the payroll

We dropped our payroll adding Lucic and replacing Hathaway with a better player for that position 

 

Now the most critical question that needs to be answered above all else ... Is will he really wear 17?  Or will Czarnik give up 27

Who cares

[travel_dude]

24 minutes ago, JTech780 said:

 

The coaches job is to win games, not to try and make one player happy. I believe we have a better chance of winning with Lucic than Neal. I think the same can be said in reverse for the Oilers.

 

We also don't know what the situation was with Neal, the coaching staff or management. Perhaps Neal requested a trade. Perhaps the relationship was so untenable that the only thing to do was to move Neal.

 

At the end of the day I think the move makes sense for Calgary, but I get the opposition.

 

And I think it was pretty obvious that Neal was aware that he needed to be better.  His comments.  His training in TO.

That part was made public.

I think that, if anything, Neal was just a bad fit.

Didn't fit with any of the top 3 lines.

We didn't need him scoring to be best in the West.

Which make him expendable.

 

So, I don;t think that the relationship soured, just that BT felt we needed a tough player more than a better scoring one-dimensional player.

It's no different than the Dougie trade.  It wasn;t about team spirit or locker room, it was about missing elements.

 

My issue with this trade will always be about the return.

A conditional draft pick geared towards our player outplaying their is just wrong.

Picking up a NMC with no premium paid by EDM is wrong.

EDM would have been happy to dump Lucic at 2m retained and still felt vindicated.

Teams were not exactly lining up to make the trade.

 

[travel_dude]

31 minutes ago, JTech780 said:

 

Neal's last shift as a Flame.

 

Never understood why he was out there with Backlund, and why they were so much out of the play.

[travel_dude]

14 minutes ago, phoenix66 said:

More like , pay Hathaway $1.5 over 4 years... Or pay Lucic -$500k I call that a win 

We didn't lose anything trading Neal..we already have his replacements on the payroll

We dropped our payroll adding Lucic and replacing Hathaway with a better player for that position 

 

Now the most critical question that needs to be answered above all else ... Is will he really wear 17?  Or will Czarnik give up 27

 

Lucic is #17 this year.  There's a pic of his new jersey already.

[sak22]

1 minute ago, travel_dude said:

My issue with this trade will always be about the return.

A conditional draft pick geared towards our player outplaying their is just wrong.

Picking up a NMC with no premium paid by EDM is wrong.

EDM would have been happy to dump Lucic at 2m retained and still felt vindicated.

Teams were not exactly lining up to make the trade.

 

We could get a better sweetener for Lucic, but then Neal has to be taken out.  James Neal eliminates the sweetener into what it was.  I think we spent the entire year bashing him, mostly for good reason, season ends and it is get rid of him at any cost and now we are really overvaluing him.  Although he doesn't have the bonuses or clauses his contract is still brutal and he was a healthy scratch in an elimination game.  I don't believe we are doing Edmonton any favours either, maybe he gets in the right spot and has better luck and  gets back to 20 goals, but if his compete level is where it was last year it still won't work for Tippett either.

[travel_dude]

5 minutes ago, sak22 said:

We could get a better sweetener for Lucic, but then Neal has to be taken out.  James Neal eliminates the sweetener into what it was.  I think we spent the entire year bashing him, mostly for good reason, season ends and it is get rid of him at any cost and now we are really overvaluing him.  Although he doesn't have the bonuses or clauses his contract is still brutal and he was a healthy scratch in an elimination game.  I don't believe we are doing Edmonton any favours either, maybe he gets in the right spot and has better luck and  gets back to 20 goals, but if his compete level is where it was last year it still won't work for Tippett either.

 

I'm just suggesting that they would like to have traded Lucic at any cost.

Sure, he has to waive to go somewhere.

With that in mind, his value should have been rock bottom.

 

One for one is not a rock bottom deal, no matter what we saw from Neal.

The fact that Lucic was willing to be traded put us in the driver's seat.

 

This is not about whether Neal will be a 20 goal scorer or not.  They seem to think so, but if that's the case, why would we take on a bloated contract in that deal.

I don't think he will do much there either, but because of that we don't even get the sweatener.

[cccsberg]

12 hours ago, travel_dude said:

 

I'm just reacting to having to use move two good LW to RW just because we cab't seem to solve roster issues.

Let's not pretend that Lucic will make a better 3rd line.

Add to that, we move Bennett to line that has worked well without him.

 

If Frolik or Brodie bring back a top 6 RW, this trade is more reasonable because we have improved the team.

 

Do I really care about losing Neal?  Not really.

Am I disappointed about the trade?  Yes.

Did this do anything to improve the team, the cap or the long term outlook?  Not that I can see. 

 

Meanwhile NYR is capped out and we can;t even make a bad trade for better players.

We supposedly were targeting a better 3rd line C and we got a LW.

Not even a younger player.

 

I believe Lucic’s 462(?) hits and his physicality is going to go through the team like a tsunami.  As we saw last year, scoring goals wasn’t a problem, having team backbone and instilling some fear into the opposition was.  Brilliant, needed move.  And frankly it doesn’t matter what Neal does, it wasn’t happening here and I’d love an extra third.... Also, Lucic can just play his physical game and bring his leadership to our younger guys.

[sak22]

7 minutes ago, travel_dude said:

 

I'm just suggesting that they would like to have traded Lucic at any cost.

Sure, he has to waive to go somewhere.

With that in mind, his value should have been rock bottom.

 

One for one is not a rock bottom deal, no matter what we saw from Neal.

The fact that Lucic was willing to be traded put us in the driver's seat.

 

This is not about whether Neal will be a 20 goal scorer or not.  They seem to think so, but if that's the case, why would we take on a bloated contract in that deal.

I don't think he will do much there either, but because of that we don't even get the sweatener.

The sweetener is the 500k in cap savings for 4 years.  You don't get a 21 year old former #4 pick or a future 1st rounder, or anything of significance when you trade away another anchor deal.  I think JP was a pipe dream in this deal that people need to let go, wasn't going to happen for Neal, Eriksson or any other bad deal.