[FlameZilla]

Originally Posted by Oling_Roachinen

Could have been less to. If arbitration has been awarding all these crazy contracts it shouldn't be an issue coming up with a couple players who were awarded with 1 million dollar contracts before playing 100 games and getting 50 points, right? Because I'm drawing more or less a blank. Yet I can name countless players who have yet to establish themselves as full-time NHLers who accepted contracts in the 500,000-800,000 range.

Like I've repeated, 81 games, 11 goals, 18 assists, 29 points over 4 NHL seasons isn't exactly a stat line that makes arbitration scary, at least not for the club. The people arguing that arbitration contract could have been crazy should provide some real life examples to comparable players for Byron and not players who had 400 games played heading into the proceeding.

Byron seems to be in a fairly unique position, with few comparables that I can find. It is definitely a mission for sureLoss or other info-miners to find some similar arb cases to Paul Byron because I can't find one.

What makes the arbitration case potentially difficult for the Flames is his most recent career-best season:

47GP 7G 14A 21PTS +6

His previous stints in the NHL were very limited (31 games over 3 seasons) and this season was his first decent shake at the stick. Pro-rated over 82 games Byron's numbers equate to 12G, 24A & 36PTS, which are pretty decent numbers for a player who just shed his 'rookie' status in the NHL. A 25-year-old utility player at .45PPG? Responsible defensively as well. It could be argued by his agent that this was a break-out season and a sign of things to come. Of course the Flames would argue with many of the points you bring up and it could get ugly.

To reference something you brought up, in Clarke MacArthur's famous arbitration case against the Atlanta Thrashers he was awarded a contract worth $2.4 million, a significant raise over his previous salary of $1.4 million. In the year before that arbitration case he scored at a career-best .42PPG pace. Though he had played 210 NHL games in 3 seasons at that point that year was his best to date. The Thrashers walked away from that contract and MacArthur signed with the Leafs at a more reasonable rate.

With that in mind, I'd say there was the potential in, Byron's case, that the arbitrator could have nearly doubled his salary. I'd say $1,000,000 AAV for 1 or 2 years wouldn't have been out of the realms of possibility, worst case scenario. Imagine if the Flames then walked away? The lowest salary he could have received in arbitration would be 85% of last years' salary which equates to $546,975 AAV but even with Byron's career stats in consideration he wouldn't have received a ruling that low.

By going this route, the Flames avoided:

• Offering Byron a qualifying offer ($707,850 which he surely would have accepted)
• A potentially ugly arbitration case where the player is flat-out confronted with all his weaknesses and why he is not valuable to the team
• An arbitration ruling which could have inflated his salary to the point where he is not a financially attractive asset

The Flames risked losing Byron to UFA, but saved at the very least $107,850 of his salary. I believe management would have known that there wouldn't be much interest in Byron league-wide, or they may have known that Byron wouldn't have been offered the same salary on a one-way contract by anyone else. And what would be the point of going to another team offering less than what the Flames would offer?

He signed so quickly that I believe the team had either told Byron what their plan for him was, or he jumped at the opportunity to stay in an organisation he's familiar with and knows where he stands. The player knows he's not in the longterm plans, but signs a short contract to try & showcase himself to the rest of the league or prove to Flames brass that he deserves a longer look while the prospects are developing in the minors. If he has another good season but the Gaudreaus and Baertschis still supplant him in the roster then he and his very reasonable salary could be used as a make-weight in any potential deals with cap-tight teams in need of cheap bodies on the roster.

It all makes perfect sense to me.

If the Flames really want to avoid arbitration, why didn't they do something similar for Colborne? If the Flames and Byron were going to sign anyways, why didn't they sign before free agent frenzy?

Regarding Colborne: a 6'5" former 1st rounder? He would inevitably be a more coveted asset league-wide than Byron and would have garnered more interest on the UFA marker. No doubt about it. Like it or not, Colborne has the size our management covets and he plays C/RW, which are few and far between. If we had not qualified Joe Colborne we would have unequivocally lost him as a UFA.

*Interesting thought: stats-wise, Colborne might be the arbitration comparable to Byron that we're looking for: 96GP 11G 23A 34PTS -15 over 3 seasons. If he's awarded anywhere near $1,000,000 AAV then I think the Flames will feel justified in doing what they did with Byron. We'll find out soon enough.