I can see why people who don’t follow the team closely do not see a team that has been upgraded significantly. There are those that think Calgary got the worse end of the draft day blockbuster. There are those who are not sold that Bill Peters is any kind of upgrade on Gulutzan (I am still skeptical myself). There are people who think we grossly overpaid James Neal.
Those who really watch the team closely (this forum) realize that something was wrong with this roster. I don’t think many of us thought this was a good team that had a few injuries and that is why they missed. The team needed to be changed on several levels and Treliving did just that.
Out: Hamilton, Ferland, Brouwer, Stajan, Versteeg
In: Hanifin, Lindholm, Neal, Ryan, Czarnik
Huge turnover and in my opinion a huge upgrade on the roster. The average age of the players going out is 30 and the average age of the players coming in is 26. The team absolutely added scoring firepower to the roster which was a huge need last year. I think the mix of players will also yield much better results. They still have a top 4 on the blue line that is among the better in the league. They have a legit top 6 now with 4 of those players 25 or younger. They have added some depth to the bottom 6 by adding Ryan, Czarnik, and bumping Frolik down. They still have 2 intriguing youngsters in Bennett and Jankowski in the bottom 6. Lastly they have some good prospects in Mangiapane, Foo, Dube, Valimaki, Andersson, and Kylington pushing for spots.
So I can see why haters or people out east who just look at the numbers saying Calgary is a bubble team but as a hardcore fan who loves their summer I think this is a team that will be in the mix for the Pacific division title.
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