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Originally Posted by powderjunkie
Definitely. I had just never come across that Burke deal since his other blunders got much more attention.
A lot of it boils down to timing. Coming off a couple of cups, Lombardi pushed a lot of chips in to try for another. Sometimes bad deals still make sense. Sometimes good deals don't (one might argue Hamilton 1.0 for instance).
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I think Hamilton made a bunch of sense, considering his age, the age of Monahan, Gaudreau, Backlund, Brodie and Gio, the expectations for Bennett, and maybe even Jankowski, and the sense that Wideman's great year was a one off. It looked like the Flames were going to be extremely deep down the middle, in a year or so, and that that the Flames had one elite winger and a few good young ones in Ferland, Colborne, Jooris and Granlund. Had a few vets in Jones, Hudler and Frolik to tide them over while the kids gre into a role. The two things they were missing were a big minute, offensive RHS D not named Wideman, and a great goalie (though Hiller and Ramo had done pretty well as a tag team).
Hamilton was 22, same age as Johnny, 2 years older than Monahan, 3 older than Bennett. I think this was a core piece being acquired.