Quote:
Originally Posted by Calgary4LIfe
Ryan - I like Ryan. I think he will be cheap to re-sign. Great on face-offs, dependable all over the ice, always giving a full effort too. What's not to like about him? I just don't see him as a 4th liner, and would rather the Flames get a bit bigger and nastier there (with hopefully some skill). I think that 4th line needs to become a 4th line that actually gives energy - hit everything on sight, legitimately hard to play against, fast, abrasive, but still capable of scoring the occasional game too like Ryan. I don't think his salary will be even half of what it is now, but I would still rather move on. Part of this is that I would also prefer that the Flames start getting larger overall, and a team with Gaudreau, Mangiapane, Dube, Pelletier, Phillips and Ryan, combined with players that overall aren't very difficult to play against like Monahan, Lindholm, Backlund, makes for a team that is overall rather easy to play against. Flames need to start looking at getting bigger, so I would prefer that his spot goes to Ruzicka, or even a FA with some size/speed/depth scoring ability.
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I find it interesting that no one is expecting Pelletier to be a Flame this year. This is the only mention of him in this thread
Likely he will need at least part of a year in the AHL but usually in the off season a 1st round pick that is NHL bound in the draft year +3 should be somewhat close to the NHL level.
Maybe there is no hype because he did not get NHL exhibition games this past season.
Valimaki got 24 NHL games in D+2 and was basically guaranteed an NHL spot in his D+4 after missing D+3