Quote:
Originally Posted by polak
little generous here.
One top 10 scoring winger - Yes
2 promising centers - One and a half, none of which are looking like legitimate #1's.
Two Young Top Pairing D? - One and one that will HOPEFULLY be able to turn into a reliable 2nd pairing guy. Scoring a lot of points doesn't forgive his gaffs.
It's not been 3 years of rebuilding by the way.
Traded Iginla, Tanguay, Sarich and Bouwmeester and drafted Monahan in 12/13. Had all of those trades worked out we could've been competitive a lot earlier so you have to count that as year 1 of the rebuild.
12/13 - Year 1 (25th)
13/14 - Year 2 (27th)
14/15 - Year 3 (16th)
15/16 - Year 4 (26th)
16/17 - Year 5 (Currently 30th in p/pg)
So no, if you told me when we traded Iginla, that 4 years later we'd be 30th at American Thanksgiving and that we had 1 sure fire first liner, 1 sure fire first pairing D, That we had 33 year old Giordano signed for 6 more years at nearly 7 million a year and he was playing like garbage, and then some decent young 2nd line players, I would not be happy.
Gaudreau, Brodie, Tkachuk are the 3 players I'm excited about for this team at the moment. Hopefully Monahan bounces back and brings that number up to 4.... 4 players in 4 years since Iginla. One of whom was already here.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Aarongavey
The Flames have a young core. Most good teams that end up being competitors compete with a young core.
Flames key players and ages
Gaudreau - 23
Monahan - 21
Bennett - 20
Backlund - 27
Brouwer - 31
Tkachuk - 18
Frolik - 28
Hamilton - 23
Giordano - 32
Brodie - 26
Tampa for comparison
Kucherov - 23
Stamk - 26
Filpulla - 32
Johnson -26
Killorn -26
Namestnkiov - 23
Drouin - 21
Palat - 25
Hedman - 25
Stralman - 30
During the Hawks first run Kane, Toews, Versteeg, Ladd, Bolland, Keith, Barker, Buff, Brouwer, Seabrook, Hjalmarsson were all under the age of 25. It is not uncommon for good teams to compete with a core around the same age as the current Flames. What is more common is if you can't compete when your best players are 21-26 you are not likely to ever compete. That year may not be this year, but it is rare for a team to suck with truly elite young players like the Flames allegedly have.
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The Flames don't have a Hedman. I'd also suggest Kucherov is better than any Flames forward. And the Flames don't have an elite goalie.
No doubt the Lightning have done an excellent job of building a great young team. But we also need to consider that the first core piece of the rebuild was Stamkos, who is 26. Monahan was the first Flames core piece, and he's 22. Four years ago, when Stamkos was 22, the Lightning still sucked (finishing 14th in the East).
The Lightning also show the importance of drafting top-3 (Stamkos #1 OA, Hedman #2 OA, Drouin #3 OA).