[GranteedEV]

Honestly, the Flames are a rough team to root for when they continue spinning their wheels with the same strategy for two+ decades. Even going back to MSL, the contrast in approach between this organizarion and Tampa Bay is remarkable. Tanpa was okay with ficing MSL an opportunity up the lineup because they had a fearless mentality. That fearless mentality helped them win the 2004 Stanley Cup, but even setting aside whether that puck was in or not, it was the same mentality that allowed them to pump the brakes when their core wasn't quite cutting the mustard, and bottomed out only four years after their Cup win to the tune of Hedman and Stamkos. The Flames on the other hand were trying to make the playoffs with a washed up Olli Jokinen as their number one centre and Jay Bouwmeester (aka the OG Hanifin) as their number one defenseman.

Then fast forward to the mid 2010s, and Brad Treliving, then an assistant GM with Arizona, "liked" Tyler Johnson, invited him to camp... but wasn't willing to take a leap of faith on the player because of preconceived notions about what works.

Tyler Johnson proceeds to center a Palat and Kucherov on the Triplets Line, which carried the Lightning to the Cup Final in 2015. Kucherov got hurt and they lost the series, but that's life.

Brad Treliving, a Flames GM, the very next year, again shows his disdain for useful smaller players, playing Paul Byron on waivers for unfathomable reasons (after a strong, albeit snakebitten year the year prior!) while granting Brandon Bollig an automatic immunity from meritocracy.

Over the next few years, names like Jonathan Marchessault and Yanni Gourde come up through Tampa's minor league system, and eventually become valued NHLers in their own right. These are but a few names that never would have cracked the Flames lineup.

Brad Treliving, trying his best to show that he can indeed hang with the cool crowd, signs Austin Czarnik in an attempt to find his own Marchessault type.

And the Flames proceed to play this offensive minded player on the Flames' shutdown line with Backlund, or with an inept centre in Jankowski. Not once did the Flames coach try Czarnik on the line of clear, obvious fit (Czarnik - Bennett - Neal or Lucic - Bennett - Czarnik the year afterwards). Czarnik isn't even necessarily bad - posting 21 pts in 62 games along with strong underlying metrics - but for Brad Treliving, an injury to Czarnik was sufficient grounds to demote the kid back to the AHL. After all, he wasn't fitting in the checking role with Backlund, so he was an AHLer.

The Flames' rigid, win-now-even-if-we-cannot approach, has been twenty years in the making. I'm hitting a point of apathy with this Phillips situation. Even if they call him up you just know he'll be a square peg in a round hole somewhere, because they lack the fearlessness to try the things that actually would make sense.