[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Calgary4LIfe

That's actually not quite true.

At the conclusion of the 2011-12 season, during the year-end wrap up, Feaster spoke with Iginla at the possibility of him moving if things don't work out the next season. The conversation came up again during training camp of the 2012-13 season. Remember the whole "Iginla might not sign with the Calgary Flames" talk?

I do remember that. Iginla and Meehan told the Flames they didn't want to discuss a new contract during the season. Based on the context, they were essentially saying this year or bust. I think the Flames knew this even before that. Moves to bring back Cammalleri, to ship out Regehr and to try to acquire Brad Richards as well as the failed attempt for O'Reilly all point to me as attempts to create a situation attractive to Iginla in order to re-sign him. The O'Reilly attempt happened just 3 weeks before the trade and may ultimately have been the catalyst for both parties to realize where this train was headed.

However, he did do some good.

1) He stopped trading picks - especially higher picks - in the season leading to the rebuild. I guess you can argue that his 'go for it plan' was not going for it, but doing something half-assed I guess, but I was happy to not see picks being traded away.

I don't agree with this.

If you're saying the rebuild season is the season they dealt Iginla and then Bouwmeester, then the season leading to the rebuild was the one where the Flames moved a 2nd rounder in the deal for Cammalleri. It's actually from this point that I believe the Flames started to really spend picks. Prior to that in his limited tenure he was neutral in amount of picks dealt, getting a pretty good return for Tim Erixon.

2) He lifted restrictions on the draft. I mean, his own incompetence forced him to rely on the experts. I like this approach. However, it wasn't so night and day like it was under Sutter anyway - Button still valued Wotherspoon over Kucherov, for example (in combination with him thinking that Kucherov would be available later - though thankfully he got Gaudreau right!).

I mean, sort of. He again traded down in the first round to 'recoup the 2nd' he had traded away. I think that kind of undercuts the scouting. By their admission they were exploring the idea of also trading that first rounder away entirely; is that an indication he was lifting the restrictions on the draft? Over Feaster's tenure the flames drafted 20 times over 3 drafts with 7 rounds apiece. He inherited a lot of that debacle from Sutter, but he didn't actually do much to address it.

After Dealing Iginla, the Flames Pick scenario works out like this

IN:

1st (bouwmeester)
5th (Comeau)
6th (Jackman)


OUT:
4th (Knight)
4th (Galiardi)
5th (Russell)
4th (Colborne)
6th (MacDermid)

For a team at or near the basement of the league during that tenure, I don't necessarily believe that is taking the restrictions off the scouting staff. In my opinion, taking restrictions off would be giving the scouting staff the benefit of multiple draft picks to take chances on guys like Kucherov earlier or not risking Gaudreau not being there by giving them an extra 3rd rounder to work with, not drafting less than the bare minimum yearly allotment over a period of sustained lack of playoff calibre rosters.

4) He hired Bob Hartley and gave the players the mandate that it wasn't ok to lose. The culture on this team completely changed from one season to the next.

Why does this warrant adulation? Hartley was bad, was out of the league for a reason and is back out of the league again for a reason. He hired one of his best friends. I don't think the Hartley hire is crow worthy.

It wasn't all bad. It was, however, terrible as a whole and downright embarrassing as a fan to cheer for an organization that was often the butt of a jokes.

I agree, it wasn't all bad. There was that one season where the team beat the canucks in the playoffs and that was great. The rest of it was some of the worst flames hockey teams i've ever seen.

Agree with the rest of your post though.